Pink Floyd is dropping their first new album in 20 years this fall.
“The Endless River” will by out via Columbia on Nov. 10, and is a whopping 18 songs long. The evolution of the album, according to a release, started with the 1993 “Division Bell” recording sessions, with David Gilmour, Rick Wright and Nick Mason. It's described as a “four-sided instrumental album” plus one song with lyrics, “Louder Than Words,” words written by Gilmour's wife, novelist Polly Samson.
Keyboardist Wright died in 2008, and the finishing of this album was “a tribute” to him, according to Gilmour and Mason.
Wrote Gilmour: “'The Endless River' has as its starting point the music that came from the 1993 Division Bell sessions. We listened to over 20 hours of the three of us playing together and selected the music we wanted to work on for the new album. Over the last year we've added new parts, re-recorded others and generally harnessed studio technology to make a 21st century Pink Floyd album.
“With Rick gone, and with him the chance of ever doing it again, it feels right that these revisited and reworked tracks should be made available as part of our repertoire.”
“'The Endless River' is a tribute to Rick,” Mason said. “I think this record is a good way of recognizing a lot of what he does and how his playing was at the heart of the Pink Floyd sound. Listening back to the sessions, it really brought home to me what a special player he was.”
The artist Storm Thorgerson formerly made all of the band's iconic album artwork, but he died in 2013. An 18-year-old digital artist, Ahmed Emad Eldin, crafted this album's artwork, seen below.
Below is the tracklist for “The Endless River,” which runs over four sides to “invoke the album listening experience”:
Side 1:
Things Left Unsaid
It”s What We Do
Ebb And Flow
Side 2:
Sum
Skins
Unsung
Anisina
Side 3:
The Lost Art of Conversation
On Noodle Street
Night Light
Allons-y (1)
Autumn”68
Allons-y (2)
Talkin” Hawkin”
Side 4:
Calling
Eyes To Pearls
Surfacing
Louder Than Words