I don't quite remember what brought this up, but last night as friends and I were out for drinks, we got into a debate in which we were trying to reason between two equally great things. As we were trying to work our way around the debate, somebody did an "a-ha" and jumped in with the name of a paradigm that described our Socratic debate- "Dark Side of the Moon" vs. "Wish You Were Here". The question, of course, is which great Pink Floyd album is better and if one can actually ascertain which one is better. Pretty much everyone agreed that while "Dark Side" is stronger song by song, "Wish You Were Here" has a resonance that "Dark Side" doesn't. Like the fact that the title track "Wish You Were Here" is maybe the best song Floyd ever did. Or there was my arguement, that while "Dark Side" is a better album, I'm more emotionally attached to "Wish You Were Here" because just hearing the first five or six notes to the album instantly brings back warm fuzzy memories, usually involving a three chambered bong named Otis.

Then somebody threw the debate into a tizzy when they threw out the elephant in the room of the discussion- "The Wall." The person who posed the original question was immediately taken aback and proposed that "The Wall," with the exception of a few songs and the cool ass cartoons from the movie, is actually not a great album. This brought cries of blasphemy and impassioned pleas to it's pretanatural greatness. I, of course, argued that "the Wall" cannot be discussed in terms of the music and it's songs but it's affect, it's status not as a great album, but as a signifier for teen angst and the universal message of "everything sucks." After all, there was a point in everyone's existence when "The Wall" was more than a disc or a movie but a way of seeing the world. And there were instances, in High School and in college, where the mere mention of it brought immediate knowing glances and feelings of "right on." For instance, my high school had this kind of shed out by the practice fields that each senior class (or more like all the cool kids) traditionally would spraypaint all their names on and write things like "San Dimas High Rules." One day, a bunch of the stoner, rebel kids painted over all the names and slogans and made it look like the shed was part of "The Wall." It was painted all white with black lines signifying bricks. It was one of the few moments in my High School existence where, just for a moment, it seemed like the underdog, the uncool kids, had risen up against cool kids. Then again, in college, a friend moved into his dorm room only to discover that a previous occupant had painted the lyrics of "Comfortably Numb" on the wall. This wasn't seen as annoying, or obnoxious, but like the sayings of an Oracle, a prophet. Who cares if the entire album falls apart after "Comfortably Numb," only a few songs are really that memorable, and the story makes no sense? That album speaks.

And we all agreed that there was no right way of answering the question and so another round of whiskey shots was proferred.