100 Greatest Albums of All Time
From ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ to ‘The Doors’ make it to the ROLLING STONE list
87. The Wall, Pink Floyd, Columbia, 1979
Pink Floyd’s most elaborately theatrical album was inspired by their own success: the alienating enormity of their tours after The Dark Side of the Moon. As the band played arenas in 1977, bassist- lyricist Roger Waters first hit upon the wall as a metaphor for isolation and rebellion. He finished a demo of the work by July 1978; the double album then took the band a year to make. Rock’s ultimate self-pity opera, The Wall is also hypnotic in its indulgence: the totalitarian thunder of “In the Flesh?,” the suicidal languor of “Comfortably Numb,” the Brechtian drama of “The Trial” and the anti-institutional spleen of the album’s unshakable disco hit, “Another Brick in the Wall, Pt. 2.” Rock-star hubris has never been more electrifying.
