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FEATURE MUSIC

(who was finishing Wings’ Red Rose Speedway record at Abbey Road at the time). Sadly, Waters deemed Macca’s answers unusable, as he told Pink Floyd biographer John Harris: “He was the only person who found it necessary to perform, which was useless, of course. I thought it was really

some viewers preferred the result of pressing play on the Pink Floyd CD after the MGM lion’s third roar, Savage personally favoured pressing play after just one roar.

Writer Charles Savage, author of Dark Side of the Rainbow

Other names for this audiovisual pairing include Dark Side of Oz or The Wizard of Floyd . Members of Pink Floyd have denied there is a connection between their album and the film, with Mason having a laugh on MTV in 1997: “It’s absolute nonsense. It has nothing to do with The Wizard of Oz . It was all based on The Sound of Music. ” Since downtime during The Dark Side of the Moon sessions was often spent watching Monty Python’s Flying Circus on BBC2, Pink Floyd – finding themselves flush following the record’s impressive sales – happily fronted up some cash to help fund the 1975 absurdist comedy Monty Python And The Holy Grail (10 per cent of the film’s Monty Python benefitted from the album’s success

interesting that he would do that. He was trying to be funny, which wasn’t what we wanted at all.” Dark Side of the Rainbow In his 1995 article titled Dark Side of the Rainbow , Charles Savage suggested readers should rent a copy of T he Wizard of Oz (on Beta or VHS, though?) from the video shop to watch, sound turned down, while listening to The Dark Side of the Moon. Apparently, during Time , the lyric “no one told you when to run” seems to prompt Dorothy to run on-screen; she also walks along the top of a holding pen, as if it were a tightrope, to illustrate the line “balanced on the biggest wave” during Breathe (In the Air) . Although

Filmmaker and actor Terry Gilliam

initial £200,000 budget, no less). During an interview, Terry Gilliam recalled, “This was at the time [that British] income tax was running as high as 90 per cent, so we turned to rockstars for finance. Elton John, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin – they all had money, they knew our work, and we seemed a good tax write-off. Except, of course, we weren’t. It was like The Producers. ...”

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BIG SCARY EXAMINE THE SEAMS OF DEVOTION

yourself as you burrow down/ People patter on the streets above/But nothing ever seems to turn your frown”. It’s a moving centrepiece guided by soft focus synths and a soft samba rhythm. Goodbye Earle Street is a widescreen ballad in the style of Bacharach, or Lana Del Rey: romantic scenes played out in hotels and parks, with talk of big stars and faultlines waiting to explode. Devotion is more intimate, but no less intense; a quiet piano melody plays as two voices sing of dependency and dependability: “Skipping on our lovely rope/ You hold your end, I hold mine”. Real Love follows like a sequel, maybe many years later, a portrait of love that’s grown and maybe a little worn. The dance is a little slower now. “This is, this is real love/ This could feel like real love,” goes the chorus. Is that a note of doubt, even after all this time? Or is that just peace with uncertainty? You Won’t Always is a beautiful parting gift, an elegy that hints at the eternal with its final run of words and suspended closing chords. SimonWinkler

Me and You by Big Scary is out Sep 23, including on gum leaf green vinyl, via Pieater/ Inertia.

M e and You is the new album from beloved local duo Big Scary, formed by Jo Syme and Tom Iansek. It’s also a creative reunion for the two, who’ve been busy recording solo albums, forming record labels, and touring with other bands. As hinted in the title, partnership lies at the heart of this new album. Vocal duties are shared, sometimes alternated, sometimes in a close echo of each other. And it all begins with a waltz. First song F.A. features a romantic piano

motif circled by strings, and a story of two lives converged. We learn from the lyrics there’s disquiet in this dance. It’s a distance that seems to deepen across the album. “I’m melting away as you rush through your morning,” Jo sings. An album as rich as Me and You sees love in the same light as loneliness. Seeds of doubt are planted throughout: “Feeling all tied up, all I want is a cut,” Tom sings on Firefly . All to Pieces could be a requiem for missed connection: “You dig another hole into the ground/ Bury

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