Pink Floyd

A Momentary Lapse Of Reason

Gilmour and company indulge in a putrid 80s sound

Review Score:

(4/10)
After the departure of Syd Barrett in 1968, Pink Floyd's two driving forces were lyricist/bass-player/conceptualizer, Roger Waters and guitarist/composer, David Gilmour. So it was inevitable that the first "Pink Floyd" album without Waters, 1987's A Momentary Lapse in Reason, was going to essentially be Gilmour's third solo effort. The only question was how badly Gilmour, obviously only wishing to keep the attention and revenue drummed up from the Pink Floyd logo, would tarnish band's name. If only he had kept the sober, wintery feel of his two previous solo works then perhaps Momentary Lapse could have been a somewhat decent album. But no. Like so many of his aging peers, Gilmour, along with drummer Nick Mason, producer Bob Ezrin and a small army of session musicians, had to pander to in the super slick, mindlessly sanguine, yuppie style of that utter waste of a decade, 1980s. "On the Turning Away" and "The Dogs of War" call up that horrid decade's flaky, unconvincing social consciousness. "One Slip" is a boring, overintellectualized ballad like those of Tears for Fears. "Signs of Life" and "Terminal Frost" replace the warm, lush surrealism of Floyd's earlier sound with drippy new age music. The ultrasynthetic sound, with its obligatory guitar solos and deep drum indents, brings guilty pleasure at best and nostalgia for a decade hence at worst. The album would be a total waist if not for "Learning to Fly" and "Sorrow." On these fantastic tracks, Gilmour's guitar throws around some serious muscle and nicely leads the thickly layered sound into a sense of fanciful electric, splendor. Without these two, however, A Momentary Lapse of Reason is just another throwaway album from one more band coasting on reputation and catering to a new unexciting, adult contemporary audience.

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