Animals (1977)
Animals is a 1977 art rock album by Pink Floyd.
Pink Floyd's tenth album turns Orwell's Animal Farm into a bleak survey of late-1970s Britain, sorting society into dogs, pigs, and sheep. Built around three long tracks, 'Dogs,' 'Pigs (Three Different Ones),' and 'Sheep,' bookended by the two short halves of 'Pigs on the Wing,' it is Roger Waters at his most caustic, with David Gilmour's guitar stretching across sprawling, brooding passages. Recorded at the band's own Britannia Row studio through 1976, the record swaps the warmth of Wish You Were Here for cold anger. The inflatable pig floating over Battersea Power Station became its lasting image.
Quick answers
What is Animals about?
Pink Floyd's tenth album turns Orwell's Animal Farm into a bleak survey of late-1970s Britain, sorting society into dogs, pigs, and sheep. Built around three long tracks, 'Dogs,' 'Pigs (Three Different Ones),' and 'Sheep,' bookended by the two short halves of 'Pigs on the Wing,' it is Roger Waters at his most caustic, with David Gilmour's guitar stretching across sprawling, brooding passages. Recorded at the band's own Britannia Row studio through 1976, the record swaps the warmth of Wish You Were Here for cold anger. The inflatable pig floating over Battersea Power Station became its lasting image.
When was Animals released?
Animals was released in 1977.
Who made Animals?
Animals is by Pink Floyd.
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A few thoughts on Animals
Listeners who lock into the album's Orwellian fury should watch Michael Radford's Nineteen Eighty-Four, which shares its grey, authoritarian dread and its vision of a herded populace. For a game steeped in the same theme of an ordinary man waking up under an unseen regime, Half-Life 2 walks through a city crushed by quiet control.
Pink Floyd's other albums for a deep-cuts binge
Animals is Roger Waters at his angriest, three long tracks sorting Britain into dogs, pigs and sheep after the warmth of Wish You Were Here. The Dark Side of the Moon, The Wall, Meddle and Atom Heart Mother trace the same band across a decade of concept records, each one built to be played front to back rather than skimmed for a single.
Big, bombastic classic rock built for arenas
The Animals tour turned the album's fury into pure spectacle, a giant inflatable pig drifting over Battersea Power Station. Led Zeppelin IV, Back in Black and Revolver sit in that same classic rock canon, while Pink Floyd: Pulse and AC/DC: Live at River Plate capture what these bands became once the songs moved from studio to stadium.