Pink Floyd‘s Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Their first album, it’s filled with classic whacked out tracks like “Bike,” “Astronomy Domine,” and “Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk.” Now EMI has released a pretty swank special three-disc edition of Piper.
You get the album remastered for stereo and also remastered for mono as well. That’s your first two discs. You also get a third disc which the Floydian hardcore will own most of already: “Arnold Layne,” “Paintbox,” “See Emily Play” and more. There are some tracks that, to my knowledge anyway, haven’t been seen before: a “French Edit” of “Interstellar Overdrive,” a stereo version of “Apples and Oranges,” an alternate version of “Matilda Mother” and “Take 6” of “Interstellar Overdrive.”
But even if somehow you don’t see enough “new” material on this release, the presentation is pretty damn cool: Storm Thorgerson, long-time Floyd designer, came up with the packaging. It has the lyrics for the album (but not the bonus tracks, mind) in a booklet stapled into the hardcover book-esque case, and a pull-out booklet that has some artwork by Syd Barrett. Oddly, one page has been left blank for “legal reasons” and pointed me back to Pink Floyd’s website, but I couldn’t readily find anything explaining this. Finally found the word here–that Syd had used an image in a collage that they couldn’t get clearance to reprint. Makes sense, I guess.
This would be worth buying just for the packaging IMHO because it’s just really damn deluxe and it might inspire the rest of the Floyd catalog to get released as such. I would not weep.
And you could buy a copy…but nah, for right now, let’s just see if you can win one. Because EMI has given us a copy to give away.
You can enter below to win, but bear in mind: if you enter the contest, you will be automagically signed up for EMI’s e-mailing lists. That’s just the way this contest rolls. If you have a problem with this, don’t enter. Hokay? Hokay.
Contest is closed! Thanks for playing.
But don’t despair! For the latest in contestage, check out the site here.
Click here to buy it from Amazon.
