Why Roger Waters Called Paul McCartney's Contribution To Dark Side Of The Moon Useless
Since its transformation from an ordinary London townhouse into the world's first building of purpose-built recording studios in 1931, Abbey Road Studios has seen some of the most iconic musicians pass through its doors. It became a hub for rock & roll in the 1950s and soon after became the studio of choice for around 90% of the songs recorded by The Beatles throughout the 1960s, according to the Abbey Road website. By the end of the 1960s, another band whose name still graces merchandise from mugs to t-shirts worldwide also used the famed studios and often crossed paths with members of the Fab Four.
Pink Floyd recorded their debut album at Abbey Road in 1967 (per the band's website). The band released "The Piper At the Gates of Dawn" that same year. During the recording sessions, they met The Beatles, who were working on "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" at the time. However, this was not the only time that Pink Floyd came into contact with members of The Beatles.
Dark Side of the Moon features snippets of spoken words
Pink Floyd hit their stride in the early 1970s with albums like "Meddle" and televised performances (per Pink Floyd). In 1972, the band began working on what would become their album "Dark Side of the Moon." Paul McCartney still often used Abbey Road Studios even after the breakup of The Beatles. Pink Floyd asked sets of questions of multiple people in the studio that they then used for "Dark Side of the Moon." McCartney was one of them. However, they did not use McCartney's answers. McCartney tried to be funny and perform rather than simply answer the questions, which was "useless," Roger Waters explained (per Showbiz CheatSheet).
Years later, Waters offered more insight into the spoken elements included on "Dark Side of the Moon." According to Genius, he chose to write down questions for people who were using or working at Abbey Road Studios. "The first card was something irrelevant and innocuous, like 'What's your favorite color?' and the last was the more enigmatic 'What do you think of "The Dark Side Of The Moon?"'" said Waters.
Paul McCartney is still a fan of Dark Side of the Moon
Waters wanted "audio snippets to mix into segues" for the album. Other questions included "Are you afraid of dying?" and "When were you last violent?" (per Genius). Whatever his intentions, "Dark Side of the Moon" went on to hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts in 1973 and spent a total of 917 weeks on the Billboard 200 charts in the years to follow.
Paul McCartney was a fan of the album as well, despite being left off during the spoken snippets in the final product. On "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon" in 2019, Fallon asked about his favorite albums. He referred to "Dark Side of the Moon" as a "great album" (per Showbiz CheatSheet). As pop culture shows, he definitely is not the only one who thinks so. The album cover (via The Sound) features a triangle with a light beam creating a rainbow. This image has since become synonymous with Pink Floyd, even though it has its origins in physics.