Review of Pink Floyd And Syd Barrett Story, The

Introduction

Pink Floyd are one of the most successful rock groups of all time, still maintaining huge record sales and popularity despite not having released anything for years. The band are probably best remembered for a string of hits in the 1970s culminating with the staggeringly successful Dark Side of the Moon (recently re-released as a Super Audio CD remixed into 5.1 and it sounds even better than ever) and The Wall, in my opinion, one of the best albums ever recorded.

In the early years, Pink Floyd consisted of lead guitarist and singer Syd Barrett, bassist Roger Waters, keyboardist Rick Wright and drummer Nick Mason. The band quickly became popular because of their long drawn out instrumentals and psychedelic light shows. However, as was all too often the case, with increased popularity came problems, and Syd Barrett was having serious drug and mental problems that had led to shows having to be cancelled. Guitarist/singer David Gilmour was then recruited alongside Barrett - the plan was that Barrett would continue to write and sing, but the band would be able to tour without him if necessary. This didn`t work and Barrett was soon out of the band. Pink Floyd never looked back.

Pink Floyd continued to grow in stature, but suddenly became absolutely huge with the release of Dark Side of the Moon, which spent a staggering fourteen years on the Billboard chart in America, and still sells strongly now - the new remastered Super Audio CD version will boost sales still further. Wish You Were Here and The Wall followed, which cemented Pink Floyd as one of the biggest acts in music history.

Video

The video is presented in 16:9 anamorphic widescreen and is of a good standard, combining archive footage and new interview material with members of the band. The archive footage is of variable quality, much of the early material is sourced form home video, but is very interesting. The newer footage is of far higher quality and the recent interviews are very good.

Audio

The soundtrack is presented in a choice of Dolby Digital 2.0, Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1. As you might expect, the Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack sounds flattest (although is more than adequate), the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack adds more depth by virtue of the extra channels and the DTS 5.1 soundtrack improves on the Dolby Digital 5.1 track with the addition of extra warmth and range to the sound. Although in reality, there`s nothing on the disc that actually warrants the extra range provided by DTS.

The soundtrack is a continual blend of interviews, the band`s music and narration from Kirsty Wark, all of which are continually enthralling for fans of the band.

Features

Extra features consist of extended interview footage, a discography and three acoustic versions of Pink Floyd songs (a snippet of one of them is included in the main feature).

The extras are accessible from nicely designed and easy to navigate menus, in an early Pink Floyd psychedelic style.

Conclusion

I was going to buy this DVD before Reviewer kindly sent me a review copy - and I`m glad that I`ve got my hands on it one way or another. I love Pink Floyd, and I loved this DVD, which is interesting from start to finish.

An excellent blend of material, with obviously excellent music and excellent contributions from the band members and others.

All in all, despite the main feature running for only 50 minutes, this is well worth watching, and adds another Pink Floyd related disc to my collection alongside The Wall and Roger Water Live. All I need now is Pulse and life will be nearly complete.