Pink Floyd at Pompeii – MCMLXXII is more like a resurrection than a remaster. At last, the band’s iconic 1971 concert film, long bootlegged and half-officially released, has been given a standalone, sonic polish by Steven Wilson.
This is Pink Floyd at their threshold moment, teetering between the freak-out residue of the Syd Barrett era and the polished cathedral of The Dark Side of the Moon.
Director Adrian Maben had the radical idea to put the band in Pompeii’s empty Roman amphitheater: no crowd, no applause, just ancient stones and Floyd’s meditative, electric sounds. They performed to ghosts, or maybe just themselves, crafting a slow-burning ritual from six main tracks: the violent serenity of “Careful With That Axe, Eugene,” the hypnotic pulse of “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun,” and the apocalypse-lullaby of “Echoes,” sliced in two to bookend the film.
“A Saucerful of Secrets” gets its due too, both in the 10-minute film cut and an extended version in Wilson’s new mix, an interstellar combustion engine of piano pummeling, gong crashes, and Stratocaster screams.
Meanwhile, “One of These Days” becomes a bass-and-drum exorcism. “Mademoiselle Nobs” is a goofy interlude with a howling dog, and the eerie “Pompeii Intro” casts an ominous veil over the ruins.
Wilson’s mix is surgical. The instruments now shimmer with clarity. Gilmour’s guitar glows like moonlight on obsidian. Wright and Waters’ harmonies drift upward like incense. It’s reverent but not precious, more revelation than restoration.
The venue—a 1st-century gladiator pit once filled with bloodlust—is the perfect paradox. Where once flesh met sword, now sonic alchemy unfolds. Maben’s film, shot with help from Godard veteran Willy Kurant and De Sica collaborator Gábor Pogány, gave concert cinema a cerebral makeover.
And then there’s the Dark Side studio footage spliced in—Floyd tinkering with tape loops and lyrical despair—reminding us how close we are to their magnum opus. For newcomers, this is the origin myth. For devotees, a long-lost scripture, finally restored. Revel in it.
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