The Dark Side of the Moon
1973 studio album by Pink Floyd / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about The Dark Side of the Moon?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
The Dark Side of the Moon is the eighth studio album by the English rock band Pink Floyd, released on 1 March 1973 by Harvest Records in the UK and Capitol Records in the US. Developed during live performances before recording began, it was conceived as a concept album that would focus on the pressures faced by the band during their arduous lifestyle, and also deal with the mental health problems of the former band member Syd Barrett, who departed the group in 1968. New material was recorded in two sessions in 1972 and 1973 at EMI Studios (now Abbey Road Studios) in London.
| The Dark Side of the Moon | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 1 March 1973 (1973-03-01) | |||
| Recorded | 31 May 1972 – 9 February 1973[1] | |||
| Studio | EMI, London | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 42:50 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Producer | Pink Floyd | |||
| Pink Floyd chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Singles from The Dark Side of the Moon | ||||
| ||||
The record builds on ideas explored in Pink Floyd's earlier recordings and performances, while omitting the extended instrumentals that characterised the band's earlier work. The group employed multitrack recording, tape loops, and analogue synthesisers, including experimentation with the EMS VCS 3 and a Synthi A. The engineer Alan Parsons was responsible for many of the sonic aspects of the recording, and for the recruitment of the session singer Clare Torry, who appears on "The Great Gig in the Sky".
The Dark Side of the Moon explores themes such as conflict, greed, time, death, and mental illness. Snippets from interviews with the band's road crew and others are featured alongside philosophical quotations. The sleeve, which depicts a prismatic spectrum, was designed by Storm Thorgerson in response to the keyboardist Richard Wright's request for a "simple and bold" design which would represent the band's lighting and the album's themes. The album was promoted with two singles: "Money" and "Us and Them".
The Dark Side of the Moon is among the most critically acclaimed albums and often features in professional listings of the greatest of all time. It brought Pink Floyd international fame, wealth and plaudits to all four band members. A blockbuster release of the album era, it also propelled record sales throughout the music industry during the 1970s. The Dark Side of the Moon is certified 14x platinum in the United Kingdom, and topped the US Billboard Top LPs & Tape chart, where it has charted for 990 weeks. As of 2013[update], The Dark Side of the Moon had sold over 45 million copies worldwide, making it the band's best-selling release, the best-selling album of the 1970s, and the fourth-best-selling album in history.[3] In 2012, the album was selected for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.[4]