50 years ago, the album that’d come to define decades of music came out. 50 years ago, the reason why I love music became a reality. A generation of T-shirts with album covers and the line, “I thought Pink Floyd was a brand of clothing” all because of one album. You don’t have to ask any lover of music if they’ve listened to The Dark Side of the Moon, because the answer is going to be yes. 50 years later, Roger Waters would decide to release a redux of his most iconic work, and it might be one of the worst albums I’ve listened to. The Dark Side of the Moon Redux might be one of the most embarrassing albums I have ever listened to. A 50-minute ego trip, from a man who can’t decide if he wants to spell out the meaning, talk pseudo-philosophy, or give some of the worst singing you’ll ever hear an embarrassment in every sense of the word.

Speak to Me:

Follows the same structure as the original Dark Side of the Moon but ten times worse. To start this out, we start the album with “Speak to Me”. The original “Speak to Me” is a short song that encapsulates everything you’re going to hear in the record. Every piece of a song can be heard, all at once. We get the key idea of what the album will be about. It’s about life. Through the instrumentals, we can pick it up. But no, the redux changes that by making the song a 2-minute monologue. In fact, most of the album is a long monologue. What does he do in the monologue? He spells out the entire meaning in 2 minutes. In 2 minutes, he just tells you “It’s about life and growing old” instead of letting the audience figure it out, he tells us in a dull and uninteresting fashion that’ll make you want to quit at the first song. It doesn’t get more obvious than “And talk to yourself as you die.” Okay great, thank you for taking away from the mystery of it all.

Breathe:

You thought there’d be a moment to breathe, “Breathe” is a song that’s so simple to cover, how could you mess it up? Those are surely questions I was wondering while listening. The song starts out with an interesting concept with the song opening with lyrics from their 1972 album Obscured by Clouds. I love the concept of (which only goes as far as a concept) of the album seeming like a reflection of his career with Pink Floyd. Too bad nothing is done further in the song. Breathe is about the first breaths of life. Here, we get the first of many times Roger Waters sings, and his vocals surely have aged. His vocals are your aging grandfather who thinks he can still sing. Instrumentals as well is not the best. While the instrumentals are the most bearable part of the entire album, they’re still a butcher of the original. Instrumental sound like a SoundCloud folk album.

On the run:

When I listened to “On The Run”, I wanted to run from the song. “On the Run” becomes a song about the final fight against evil. A long rant about good and evil. No singing, barely an instrumental, it’s just him talking about good and evil for nearly 4 minutes. Ultimate nothing of a song that’s ever nothing. Had to physically restrain myself from skipping the song. I wish I had more to say, but it’s so annoying. Three songs in I was over it by this point. There’s still much left.

Time:

Right when you’re reminded of the time wasted on the album, we finally get to “Time”. The most iconic Pink Floyd song, and ironically one of the worst here. “Time” starts the worst section of this album, or as I like to call it, “Why are these songs so long?” The next 4 songs are over 5 minutes in length each, and you can surely feel each excruciating minute ahead. “Time” starts in the most boring and generic way imaginable. It starts with a reverbed version of the intro and another monologue. Nothing to do with “On the Run”, just another monologue. When we get to the song itself, it’s the most uninteresting and boring-sounding voice imaginable. His voice is kind of distorted, but it’s so bland and poorly done I’m rolling my eyes the entire time.  Really long instrumental as well, with nothing to offer besides a much-deserved break from his voice. The song ends with a reprise of breath, where in a new context, it talks about a cynical viewpoint of organized religion and the afterlife. While executed horribly, is the coolest idea possible. The album is about death, and a big question throughout life is ‘Is there anything after this life?’ A question the original album failed to deliver on. Instead, we just get another boring song.

The Great Gig in the Sky:

Here we have it, the worst song on the album. Isn’t it funny how “The Great Gig in the Sky” is the best song on the original, but becomes unbearable on the remix? If he couldn’t recreate the vocals from the original version, I totally understand. The vocals on the original would be impossible to even match. I can understand trying to do something unique, but 5 straight minutes of a nonstop (and worst-written) monologue on the project? The entire track now reads as a guy going “I’ve lived a long life and people close to me are dead now, feel bad for me.” It continues with this egregious tumbler post for 5 minutes. I don’t mean to be mean, because I am sure those deaths and people meant the world to him, but please hire another writer or anything. While writing this, I realized another interesting thematic idea that is, surprise surprise, poorly handled. Several songs throughout the album become inverses of their original versions on The Dark Side of the Moon. The original song is about refusing to embrace death and take it quietly, while in the remix, it’s now about accepting death, and knowing it happens. An amazing idea, too bad it only goes to the surface level with any comparisons.

Money:

“Money” is next, and it’s another butcher of a classic. Instrumental sounds like a type of slow-core song you’d find on YouTube. It does sound a bit better than a majority of the album, it’s still not a song I’d particularly like to listen to again. Roger Waters at least sounds like it’s something he wants to make. I can feel like he did put some passion into it. Here, he has something to his voice. Lyrically, while boring, it’s just him talking about how ‘he has so much money, and look I’m using it.’ There is one line that stuck with me. “I’m sorry I’ll read that again.” He has an early form of dementia, and hearing the line is devastating. The line almost feels like a surrender for life. While the rest of the lyrics aren’t good, that one single line breaks my heart. Nothing but defeat.

Us and Them:

The final track on the 5+ minute slog, “Us and Them”. The most boring song on the album. For review purposes, I relisted the song, and I cannot tell you a single thing about the song right after listening to it. The lyrics are boring, the vocals are very boring, instrumental is still boring. I just sat there, nodded my head ok for 6 minutes, then moved on to better non-Dark Side of the Moon Redux songs. I want to say something unique and insightful, but I cannot think of a single thing to talk about here. At least we’re at the end now.

Any Colur You like:

FINALLY, the worst segment is over. We get to the finish line with a line about Ukraine. Just wonderful. The instrumental on “Any Colur You Like”. is honestly very boring. It’s still the same SoundCloud style of folk found throughout the rest. It’s boring, it’s generic, and I truly have nothing new to say. I do find it interesting to see the opening summarized the entire album quite well with “this is hard to understand.” The song is the average song on the album. The song ends with Waters asking what your flag, is before referencing the Ukrainian flag, several flags I couldn’t identify, and the pride flag. This could just be a nothing line, but Waters has made comments about how the Russian/Ukrainian war ‘wasn’t entirely unprovoked’, so taking this into consideration, it becomes a less innocent set of lyrics. Take that as you will.

Brain Damage:

“Brain Damage” is my favorite song on the album. Mainly because the intro is someone saying, “Re-recording the dark side of the moon is insane.” honestly, with what was ahead, they were right. “Brain Damage” has always been one of my least favorite tracks from Dark Side of the Moon, so I honestly have very little to say. The instrumental here is my favorite. It doesn’t particularly fit the tone of the track, but it sounds sweet.  I could see it working within a better album, but here it’s just fine. The song could’ve been fun under better circumstances, but here it’s just a bearable song I might listen to if someone told me they wanted to.

Eclipse:

“Eclipse” is one of the least embarrassing songs from here. The concept of this song is rad as well. This is the original song, with Roger Waters’s vocals in the background. For a moment, I went “This is an amazing concept.” Ending the album with the original song intermixed with an older Roger Waters is brilliant. The album had themes of aging and memory. Mixing the two albums for one final song Is powerful. Or it would be powerful if Roger Waters’s vocals weren’t horrendous, and they still managed to mess up the instrumental. This song Tight Here frustrated me the most. The entire time I was listening to the song, I couldn’t help but imagine what if. What if a concept like this was the album? What if instead of pseudo-philosophical rants throughout a majority, we instead got an aging man trying to make sense of what his masterpiece was? When I think about this could’ve been the album we got, I get sad. For how horrendous it was, there was an interesting concept, that if expanded upon, could’ve been something great. Instead, we got a mess of an ego trip. Why does the song have to end with a singular glimmer of possible greatness? At least it’s over now. While a personal thing, it also really bothers me how it ends with a heartbeat, while the album itself didn’t start with a heartbeat.

Conclusion:

Writing this hurt, it really did. Pink Floyd is my favorite band of all time, and I hate to write what boils down to a mean hate piece. Roger Waters might be egotistical, but he’s coming near the end of life. And even if it’s horrible, you can tell this is a project he truly cared about and wanted to do justice. If you get anything away from my review, go and listen to the original album. It’s one of my favorites, and it’s a classic for a reason. The Wizard of Oz theory and all these other nuances when it comes to The Dark Side of the Moon are still discussed to this day for a reason. Do yourself a favor and please listen to any other 2023 release or any classic Pink Floyd album. Don’t waste your time on the most embarrassing ego trip of the decade and listen to the hundreds of other albums from this year or give the original Dark Side of the Moon another listen. For me, I’m going to do my best to forget about this album’s existence after I finish writing this review. The little possible glimmers of something more, aren’t enough to save a pretentious trainwreck, too busy with its own self-importance to be an album. At least I have a clear least favorite of the year now.

Rating: 2/10

Photo Credits: SGB and Cooking Vinyl