Pink Floyd - ...It's All Dark (1972)

I thought that I'd heard just about every version of the classic 'Dark Side Of The Moon' that I'd ever want o hear - the original vinyl, the CD, the live Wembley concert from 1974, remastered, remixed, and so on - but this album caught my eye when I stumbled on it last week. I know that Floyd spent a considerable time in the studio, and also toured working versions of the songs throughout 1972, and this disc collects the best of them to imagine what the album could have sounded like in it's earliest incarnation. These are the notes from the CD:
'Dark Side Of The Moon', like most of Pink Floyd's 70's works, underwent a lot of transformations from its initial inception as a concept album early in 1972. After initially laying down demos for their future masterwork the band set out for their first British tour of 1972 in January and February. Fans were treated to the unveiling of the work at the opening night of the tour at Brighton Dome on January 20, heralding the debut performance of the album.
'Dark Side...' in those days was much more of a bluesy concept than the lush, layered career defining work that it became, and as the tour progressed solos changed and the piece began to be knocked into shape. The press were invited down to the first of four consecutive nights at the Rainbow on February 17 and a world buzz began that the Floyd were working on an epic.
The band continued to tour in the Spring, playing dates in Japan, Australia, America, and Europe, before going back into the studio in the summer to record the bulk of the album, with the final recording being completed in January 1973. What's been assembled on this disc is a hybrid of the album in its embryonic state, from the earliest demos to the legendary and until now never circulated 'One Side Of The Moon' tape which has only ever been heard by a handful of Floyd devotees. Legend has it that when the album was remastered in the 90's the engineers broke for lunch leaving the tape on. One employee realised that he had only 30 minutes before they returned, and ran off a copy of side 2 with all the faders pushed to the max, to leave an unedited version complete with instrumental passages, second guitars and sax solos that had been removed from the final version.
It's startlingly different in places, and one can only surmise what the first side would have sounded like before being edited. We have demos for most of the songs on side one with the exception of 'Speak To Me/Breathe' and 'The Great Gig In The Sky', and so to fill in the gaps we used a version of 'Speak To Me/Breathe' from one of the Rainbow concerts in February '72, and from the same gig we've replaced 'The Great Gig In The Sky' with its predecessor 'The Mortality Sequence'. 
I've done a bit of editing, fading and crossfading to make it a smoother listen, as in their original state the tracks didn't blend into each other as in the final mix of the album, and even if, like me, you've heard this album a thousand times, then you still need to hear this early version at least once.

Track listing
  
01 Speak To Me (Mason) London, Rainbow Theatre 20 Feb 1972
02 Breathe (Waters/Gilmour/Wright) London, Rainbow Theatre 20 Feb 1972
03 On The Run (Gilmour/Waters) Studio Outtake Nov 1972
04 Time (Waters/Wright/Gilmour/Mason)/
     Breathe (Reprise) (Waters/Gilmour/Wright) Demo Jun 1972
05 The Mortality Sequence (Waters/Gilmour/Wright) London, Rainbow Theatre 20 Feb 1972
06 Money (Waters) Alternate Mix 1972
07 Us And Them (Waters/Wright) Alternate Mix 1972
08 Any Colour You Like (Gilmour/Mason/Wright) Alternate Mix 1972
09 Brain Damage (Waters) Alternate Mix 1972
10 Eclipse (Waters) Alternate Mix 1972