How to Hear Pink Floyd's Long-Lost 'Animals' Guitar Solo

When Snowy White laid down a guitar solo for Pink Floyd’s 1977 album Animals, he did not suspect it could go unheard by most followers.

His contribution to “Pigs on the Wing” solely appeared on the 8-track version of the album and died with the format within the early ’80s — till the web revived it.

The 8-track tape (formally referred to as Stereo 8) discovered success within the vehicle world as a result of the tape inside was looped. No motion was mandatory to flip between sides of the tape, or for the album to begin enjoying once more as soon as it completed. But the format additionally had notable restrictions.

For one, it wasn’t attainable to regulate the fastened size of the 4 stereo tracks, which means that songs had been usually minimize within the center. A standard answer was to fade the track out towards the top of 1 observe, then fade it again in at the beginning of the subsequent, rewinding the grasp tape just a few seconds in order that – regardless of the impolite interruption – the listener did not truly miss out on any music.

For one other, the order of songs generally had to change to take care of the fastened size of the 4 tracks. It labored on a technical stage, but it surely was hardly excellent for artists who specialised within the album format, reminiscent of Pink Floyd.

When the prog icons confronted these points on the 8-track model of Animals, they got here up with an answer of their very own. While “Dogs” was break up into two items, the band took a extra refined method to “Pigs on the Wing (Part One)” and “Pigs on the Wing (Part Two),” which respectively opened and closed the usual version. They determined to sew the tracks collectively as one lengthy track initially of the 8-track model.

Listen to Pink Floyd’s 8-Track Version of ‘Pigs on the Wing’

After unintentionally erasing one in every of David Gilmour’s takes, the band tasked White with chopping a solo that might bridge each elements of “Pigs on the Wing.” His solo seems solely on the 8-track model of Animals and has taken on a legendary standing amongst Pink Floyd followers. The Blind Man Sees All weblog famous that as Pink Floyd continued to reissue their catalog, the alternate “Pigs on the Wing” “became the only commercially unavailable piece of music the band had ever officially released.”

White’s solo was the results of a spur-of-the-moment resolution. Pink Floyd had invited the guitarist to the studio and supplied him a place of their touring band with out listening to him play a notice. After White accepted, Roger Waters determined to put his abilities to the take a look at.

“We went back into the control room, and as I’m passing Roger, he said, ‘Hey, while you’re here, you might as well play something. Why don’t you play a solo in the middle of this track?'” White advised Vinyl Writer Music in 2022. “As it turns out, that track was ‘Pigs on the Wing.’ So I said, ‘Yeah, alright. No worries,’ and I picked up a guitar at random. … I did a quick and quiet sort of run-through, and then Roger said, ‘OK, ready?’… ‘Yeah, alright,’ and then Roger pressed the red button, and started recording.

“I went via the solo, and what you hear is the primary take,” White continued. “There was no different. I obtained fortunate! I imply with one thing like that, you by no means know, and I had no concept what they even wished. They simply let me have at it, and I did it in a single minimize.”