Pink Floyd – Animals (1977)

Animals is well known for its cover with the Battersea Power Station and a flying pig on it, but only true Pink Floyd fans normally remember songs from this album. I would say this is probably the least commercial and least well-known of the 70's Pink Floyd albums. There are only five songs on the album of which three are more than ten minutes long. This album is more clearly progressive rock and it has less art rock and psychedelia influences than any album before it. Also, it's not quite as straightforwardly about the individual songs like the later albums. Animals is truly the jewel of the vinyl era, because it's all about the album more than individual songs, it has a great cover and it has a concept. Unfortunately I already got this album in the 90's when vinyl wasn't cool, so I own this album on a CD only.



The album is loosely based on George Orwell's book Animal Farm. All the songs are named after animals and the lyrics deal with issues around social class and the record can more widely be seen as a critique of capitalism. Therefore, the album cover is very fitting for this album. The Battersea Power Station and the area around it was in the late 70's quite a rough area, due to the industrial surroundings and the amount of council housing. Only more recently the area has been cleaned up and right at the moment, luxury apartments are being built right next to the station. the factory itself has been stripped of its chimneys so that they can be properly cleaned and installed back when the old power station will be filled with expensive shops and more luxury housing. Looks like capitalism has won over the area that used to be inhabited by poor factory workers. This of course doesn't mean that the poor would've ceased to exist, they've just been moved away from Central London, as the prices have risen too high for any working classes. So, there's a lot of symbolism in the cover that Pink Floyd themselves couldn't foresee when they released this album.

The only short songs on this album are the intro and outdo that both go by the title Pigs on the Wing. These songs sound already quite a lot like some of the songs that would be released a couple of years later on the concept album The Wall. Rest of the album consists of long songs filled with solos and different parts. First one of these is Dogs, that shows how skilful David Gilmour had become with his solos that portrayed sounds that had never been heard before. This is the only song on the album that was co-written by Gilmour. All the other songs have been written by Roger Waters and I think you can hear it in the sounds. Pigs has many rhythmic sections and it really sounds a lot like some of the later songs on The Wall. Sheep on the other hand has some dark and almost funky psychedelia that resembles some earlier Pink Floyd albums such as Meddle. This song is almost outright rock music with its rough guitars and rhythmic galloping.

All of the long songs on this album have gotten their own music videos that show cartoons about Orwell's animal farm. Here's the video for Pigs (Three Different Ones). I don't know if these videos were actually made for the songs or if they have been assembled in some other ways, but they really do look great!

I haven't listened to Animals as much as I have other Pink Floyd's 70's albums, but I feel like I should pay a bit more attention to it now as I've discovered more layers and meanings in it. It's an amazingly ambitious album that requires quite a few listens before revealing all of its potential.

Listen to the album on Spotify.