Like black holes in the sky

Pink Floyd - Wish you were here - 1975

On June 5th, 1975, while Pink Floyd were recording this album, a fat, weird looking guy with a bald head and shaven eyebrows walked into the studio. He just hang around there, not talking, doing odd but harmless things. For a good while, none of the band members recognised him and just assumed that he was someone's friend. In a way he was, because he was no other than Syd Barrett. According to those who were at the studio at the time, he "wasn't fully there", and some of the people there cried at the sight of him. Fate, chance, or who knows what, wanted him to just wander in on the day they were mixing "Shine on you Crazy Diamond" of all songs. He allegedly offered to help with the recording, but never seemed to even realise the song was about him.
Apparently, the band members never saw him again until his death. That is, other than a brief appearance at David Gilmour's wedding reception, about which there seems to be a lot of confusion, since some sources say it was on the day of Syd's visit to the studio, but most sources say that the wedding took place on July 7th, 1975. Fate, chance, or who knows what, wanted July 7th, 2006 to be the day Syd left us to shine somewhere else in this, or another, universe.
Fate, chance, or who knows what, wanted me to be writing about all this on the last few minutes of July 7th, 2018. And I swear that I have just realised that today was the anniversary of Syd's death.

There's not much i can say about this album, to be honest. It's just too brilliant, too beautiful to not ruin the experience by talking about it.
There's one thing that I think is worth mentioning, though. I've often wondered why is it that this is my favourite Pink Floyd album, out of so many brilliant ones they have released over the years. What I don't think I had really figured out before is that this album has a lot more feeling and soul than many other PF's ones, which sometimes tend to be musically amazing but a bit too clinical. The heartfelt sadness, especially in "Shine on you Crazy Diamond" and the title track, are quite palpable, and make this one a very special album.

• 4:17 : That's when my absolutely favourite 20 seconds in the history of music begin. This is "Shine on..." part VI, near the end of Gilmour's solo which, in itself, is a thing of beauty, and one of his best. This whole part is my favourite one, and the way the solo builds momentum is amazing. But that moment, when the guitars seem to be crying or wailing, are simply out of this world and I even feel a bit of disappointment when the vocals begin. It's hard to explain, you have to hear it, and probably it won't affect you like me, and that's just fine. 
• At the fadeout of part IX, very near the end, you can hear Richard Wright playing on the keyboard a bit of Barrett's "See Emily Play".
• This was very much about Syd, maybe on a different day it would have been different. I'm OK with it being this way. Of course, I'm sharing "Shine On", parts VI-IX. In the youtube version, my favourite bit starts a bit earlier, at 4:12. 

En yab na log a toc na awd

Mike Oldfield - Ommadawn - 1975

While I hadn't forgotten how much I like this one, I think I didn't quite remember how much I really always enjoyed listening to it.
I think this one is much easier to listen to than Tubular Bells, because it's a bit less progressive. I know, you are probably wondering what's "less progressive" about an album in which, again, there's basically one single track spanning two sides. But this album has a lot of elements of Celtic folklore to it, which make it much more interesting and fun. And it has some vocals, which make it sound a lot more human, so to speak.
You still need to have the patience to listen to really long tracks, and I think Part 1 is better than the second one, and the whole thing may be a bit bloated. It's possible that you could shave off a few minutes by removing some parts.
But I like this album a lot, not for every day listening, perhaps, but I'm glad I rediscovered it now. I only ever listened to these two Mike Oldfield albums, so I can't talk about "best", but this is the one I like the most of two really great albums.

• The quote that I chose as title is part of the short lyrics in Part 1. It's Irish Gaelic, and story has it that Oldfield asked one of the musicians to write the first thing that came into her head. The line above means, I think, "the cat's drinking milk". The other lines are as nonsensical. They do sound cool though.
• Incidentally, one of the words is "amadan", which means "idiot", and that's how the album came to be called "ommadawn". 
• I'm putting Part 1 here, if you have the time and patience (today is a long song day, I know). 

Dicen que en este valle, los duraznos son de los duendes

Invisible - Durazno Sangrando - 1975

I don't think I have listened to this one since I was in my teens. I think I remember liking it more back then than I do now, to be honest.

I have mentioned that the first album by the band seemed to me like a crazier King Crimson. This one, I think, feels a bit like a less fun King Crimson. Still deep rooted in the sort of jazz/rock fusion style of the first album, but with too much emphasis in instrumentation and experimentation, and few moments that are truly fun. Especially in the longer tracks, of which there's a lot of here. 

The album has two really long tracks (one 10 minutes, the other a bit over 15) and three shorter ones. One of the short ones, the title track (which means "Bleeding Peach"), is one of my favourite Spinetta tracks. But that song has a strange and quite beautiful melody, which is what's missing in the longer ones. The other two short tracks are quite good, actually.

It's also likely that after so much progressive, I'm a bit short of patience, but I do feel that some of the tracks here would have benefitted with a measure of editing and focus. 

• As usual, you can find the whole album here.
• In theory, the album is a bit of a conceptual one, based on some Chinese philosophy book that was translated by Carl Jung. There are some references to Jungean concepts, such as anima and animus, but other than that, I have no idea. 
• I'm putting the title track here. By the way, the title of this section, which is from this song, translates as: "They say that in this valley, the peaches belong to the goblins". I think it sounds better in Spanish!.