It’s hard to believe this album is 50 years old. Its core is in two parts bookending the album. It’s entitled ‘Shine on You Crazy Diamond’ in tribute to founder member Syd Barrett. On part one Dave Gilmour re-establishes himself as an incisive and inventive guitarist while part two veers into jazz funk territory – well, Nick Mason did call the album “the descendent of “Meddle”. The title track has become a busker’s standard. Apart from that are two songs which take a dig at t

“The third and final volume in the 'Before the End' series; a collection of non-album tracks and assorted songs brought together from the years 2022 to 2025. Like the previous instalments, everything here has been carefully remastered and sequenced to work as a cohesive album in its own right.” ‘Just Another Goodbye’ begins the album with “a touch of fusion”. The vignette ‘Project B’ sounds unfinished, electronic in style along with the more substantial ‘Project A’. All instr

Freedom Suite (1958): This near twenty-minute long number is an improvised jazz-blues was the first extended instrumental piece of protest music. Typical of the idiom in which it was written it uses a basic line-up of sax, bass ( Oscar Pettiford ) and drums ( Max Roach ) to use a melody (as well as a few straight forward lyrics) and turn it inside out in a series of variations, developing an ambience that strikes the emotion as well as the intellect. Emily Bonnell, writing f