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The show - and it is a show - is as much an exploration of how their attitude to design and performance was as important and groundbreaking as their music. It is an immersive, sensory and theatrical exploration of the Pink Floyd universe. Senior curator Victoria Broackes said when the exhibition was announced: “Pink Floyd occupied a distinctive experimental space, consistently pushed artistic boundaries and produced some of the most iconic imagery in popular culture.” The band’s interest in marrying sound and imagewasn’t something they gradually grew into. Come out of the Bedford van, and exhibition visitors will be immediately immersed in the UFO Club, where Pink Floyd regularly played 50 years ago to a backdrop of Peter Wynne-Willson’s experimental light shows. The lighting designer went on to be internationally recognised. Their 1967 gig at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London – the 50th anniversary of which coincides almost to the day with the opening of this exhibition – was famous for being the first-ever surround sound concert, where a quadrophonic speaker system blasted footsteps, birdsong and laughter across the auditorium. Meanwhile, members of the band chucked potatoes at a gong, set off a bubble machine and watched amused as a crew member dressed as an admiral lobbed daffodils into the crowd.True, it still sounds ridiculous, but there’s a distinct lineage from this experimental show to what is expected from contemporary bands – for instance, during Coldplay’s arena tour, cannons blasted confetti at an audience wearing individual LED bracelets that pulsed light in time to the music. As Syd Barrett said in 1967: “In the future, bands are going to have to offer more than a pop show. They are going to have to an offer a well presented theatre show.” Barrett wasn’t unused to hyperbole. But he was right. Curator Broackes noted that “as well as amazing their audience, their performance that day significantly raised expectations of live rock shows. It was a major turning point for the band and a major turning point for rockmusic in general.” As was the sleeve for Pink Floyd’s second album, 1968’s A Saucerful Of Secrets. In 2017, it almost seems cliched in its psychedelic tropes; the wild colours, the spacey, ethereal shapes. An appreciative magazine review called the cover an attempt to mirror three “altered states of consciousness” – religion, drugs,and Pink Floyd music. But the cliche came from everyone else copying it. Unlike the debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1967), there were no headshots of the band – nor even the name of the record. Instead, the first ever album design from their friends Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell had a distinct sense of intrigue. Thorgerson and Powell’s design company, Hipgnosis, would go on to impart a similarly enigmatic visual identity “ BANDS ARE GOING TO HAVE TO OFFER MORE THAN A POP SHOW” SYD BARRETT22 Poster for Piperat the Gates of Dawn, unknown artist (1967)3 Pink Floyd album covers 1967–1994IMAGES: 1 © PINK FLOYD MUSIC LTD, PHOTO BY VIC SINGH;2 © VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON; 3 ALL © PINK FLOYD MUSIC28PINK FLOYDThe Arts Society ReviewSummer 2017