Pink Floyd’s 1987 album, A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, has been remixed and updated from the original master tapes and will be released on October 29, 2021 via Sony Music, in a variety of formats with Stereo and 5.1 mixes. In addition, for the first time, the album will be presented in 360 Reality Audio, a new immersive music experience that, according to the Sept. 2 announcement, “closely mimics the omni-directional soundscape of live musical performance for the listener using Sony’s object-based 360 Spatial Sound technologies.”
The work was originally done for the band’s 2019 box set, The Later Years, by Andy Jackson with David Gilmour, assisted by Damon Iddins.
A Momentary Lapse Of Reason will also be released in Dolby Audio and UHD in addition to 360 Reality Audio, all of which will continue with other Pink Floyd releases.
A special version of the video “Learning to Fly” is available simultaneously with Sony 360RA immersive audio: if you watch the video on YouTube with headphones you experience simulated 360RA sound.
The announcement further notes: By returning to some of Richard Wright’s original keyboard takes, and by re-recording new drum tracks with Nick Mason, producers David Gilmour and Bob Ezrin have restored a better creative balance between the three Pink Floyd members.
“Some years after we had recorded the album,” says Gilmour, “we came to the conclusion that we should update it to make it more timeless, featuring more of the traditional instruments that we liked and that we were more used to playing. This was something we thought it would benefit from. We also looked for and found some previously unused keyboard parts of Rick’s which helped us to come up with a new vibe, a new feeling for the album.”
Wright, one of the group’s co-founders, died in 2008. The album, the band’s 13th studio release, was also their first without founding member Roger Waters. It was another significant success with worldwide sales estimated at 10 million copies.
“Bob Ezrin had worked on The Wall with us back in ’79 and on some solo albums with me,” continues Gilmour. “We started working on pieces of music that I had been writing and… we knew it was going well. One day, I felt this ‘thing’ coming on me that became ‘Sorrow.’ I wrote five verses one evening. They just flowed out from nowhere in one of those great serendipitous moments that you recognize later as having been very valuable…. I knew that we were on a good roll and that this thing was going to work.”
Mason notes, “Initially it seemed a bit odd to start re-assembling a record after 35 odd years, but the public’s appetite for alternate views of the same work has undoubtedly increased immeasurably over time.
“Inevitably the opportunity to revisit earlier work from a period where digital technology was the brave new world became increasingly interesting.
“There’s little doubt of the advantages in being able to find new elements within the music, or more often uncovering elements that became overwhelmed with all that new science…I think there is an element of taking the album back in time and taking the opportunity to create a slightly more open sound – utilizing some of the things we had learned from playing so much of the album live over two massive tours.
“I enjoyed re-recording drum tracks with unlimited studio time. Momentary Lapse had been recorded under considerable stress and time constraints, and indeed some of the final mixing was done at the same time as rehearsals for the forthcoming tour.”
The remixed and updated A Momentary Lapse Of Reason album also features a new album cover using an alternative beds photo by Robert Dowling from the original album cover shoot directed by the late Storm Thorgerson. Echoing the iconic original sleeve the 2021 album artwork is designed and art directed by Aubrey Powell/Hipgnosis and Peter Curzon/StormStudios.
The album will be available as single CD, CD +DVD set, CD + Blu-Ray set, 2x 180gm LP set, the latter cut at half-speed at 45rpm for enhanced sound quality.
Related: More about 2019’s The Later Years box set
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DVD / Blu-ray Audio-Visual Bonus Material
Music Videos
Learning To Fly 4.28
Album Cover Photo Shoot 1987 8.46
Learning To Fly (alternate version) 4.31
Concert screen films (1987)
Signs Of Life 4.20
Learning To Fly 1.54
The Dogs Of War 1.51
Documentary:
David Gilmour & Storm Thorgerson – Interview 1.48
Re: A Momentary Lapse Of Reason Album Cover Photo Shoot
Audio only:
The Dogs Of War (live, Atlanta 1987) 7.10
On The Turning Away (live, Atlanta 1987) 6.52
Run Like Hell (live, Atlanta 1987) 7.20
Total: 49.00
