But, as a whole it’s awful schmaltzy and a little vapid. And, there are sounds that draw pictures. As Impressionism, it’s occasionally effective, but on a very imitative level. The best that can be said for it is that it’s craftsman-like and that in spite of its many parts, it’s an entity. They use orchestral elements and a choir. However, Floyd’s discarded outtakes contained a musical sequence around which the Atom Heart Mother suite would evolve. The soundtrack included just three Floyd tracks, padded out with songs by the Grateful Dead, among others. Zabriskie Point appeared in February 1970 and was a resounding flop. It was hell.”įloyd lasted two weeks in Rome and then came home. However, the director, worried their music would overpower his movie, criticised everything: “You’d change whatever was wrong and he’d still be unhappy. “We did some great stuff,” insisted Waters. Zabriskie Point was the next stage on Floyd’s varied musical journey, but the band quickly discovered that Antonioni was an impossible taskmaster. They’d stopped releasing singles after December 1968 and had followed their second album, that year’s A Saucerful Of Secrets, with a soundtrack for the art house movie More.

The early Pink Floyd had embraced the unexpected and the concept of being, as drummer Nick Mason put it, “more than just a pop group”. They arrived in Rome to start recording in November ’69. Italian director Michelangelo Antonioni had commissioned Pink Floyd to score his next film, Zabriskie Point. An album that ended with a cow in a field in Potters Bar, Hertfordshire, began over a year before in Rome.

Atom heart mother cover