Pink Floyd recently put up 12 live albums on Spotify and other streaming platforms captured between 1970 and 1972 in the U.S., UK, Canada, Europe and Japan. With no official fanfare from the legendary band, the dozen live titles appeared on streaming earlier this week licensed to Pink Floyd Music Ltd.
The live LPs go as follows:
- They Came in Peace, Live, Leeds University 1970 Washington University 1971
- Live at Grosser Saal, Musikhalle, Hamburg, West Germany 25 Feb 1971
- Mauerspechte Berlin Sportpalast, Live 5 June 1971
- Live, Lyon 12 June 1971, Tokyo 16 March 1972
- Live in Rome Palaeur 20 June 1971
- Amsterdamse Bos Free Concert 26 June 1971 (Live)</li>
- Live in Montreux 18 & 19 Sept 1971
- KB Hallen, Copenhagen, Live 23 Sept 1971
- KB Hallen, Copenhagen, Vol II, Live 23 Sept 1971
- Over Bradford Pigs on the Groove Bradford University, Live 10 Oct 1971
- Embryo, San Diego, Live 17 Oct 1971
- The Screaming Abdabs Quebec City, Live 10 Nov 1971
1970 – ‘72 was a formative time for Floyd. Much of the material on the live albums comes from the band’s LPs of the era including More (1969) Ummagumma (1969), Atom Heart Mother (1970) and Meddle (1971) which saw the quartet developing their signature sound following the departure of primary songwriter and guitarist Syd Barrett in 1968. The culmination of the period was 1973’s The Dark Side Of The Moon, which propelled the band to iconic status.
The trove of live albums begins chronologically with They Came in Peace, Live, Leeds University 1970 Washington University 1971 (the Washington University show is missing) and many of the ‘70s albums feature explorations on early post-Syd psychedelic classics like the delightful dark “Careful With That Axe, Eugene, the atmospheric “Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun” and the sprawling “Atom Heart Mother.”
All three of the aforementioned songs along with “Echoes,” “Saucerful Of Secrets” and more can be heard on Live in Montreux 18 & 19 Sept 1971 with “Atom Heart Mother” performed alongside an orchestra giving a live reading closer to the symphonic album original. Live, Lyon 12 June 1971, Tokyo 16 March 1972 also features an orchestral “AHM” (the show is incomplete on the recording). The lion’s share of that record is a partial show in Tokyo March 1972 (it appears the show actually took place on March 6) and features a nearly complete performance of Dark Side (Floyd performed the complete album but the recording is missing Dark Side tracks “Brain Damage” and “Eclipse”) before its release.
Stream all 12 live Pink Floyd albums below:
