Let There Be More Light

Before I begin:

There is a LOT of bad stereo panning in this song, probably more than on any other late '60s 4-track recording. As such, the mixing board goes nuts, there are clicks and drop-outs all over the place, and there are more anomalies in this one song than there are on entire ALBUMS. This is a modest attempt to catalogue as many of them as I could find. I would suggest that you track down a decent recording of the original mono LP mix of this and other early Floyd songs, since they have no panning and are free from many of these problems.

Because of all the panning that Pink Floyd insisted on doing, they used up three tracks of tape to record the backing instruments (guitar, drum kit, organ and bass), leaving just one track for all overdubs. This meant that they had to record all the lead and background vocals live onto that one track and then pan it around as necessary. And get this: there are four vocal parts in Let There Be More Light and only three singers in Pink Floyd.

The quiet verses ("far, far, far, far away...") are sung by Rick, with Roger whispering them under his breath. But then the track pans over to the left (with all the clicks and drop-outs that we have come to associate with panning), and we hear Dave sing the loud verses ("then at last the mighty ship..."). THEN Roger joins him in harmony ("at Mildenhalllllll...") as the track pans over to the right again. But while Dave is still singing the tail end of his verse, Roger has to start whispering the next verse. This is where many of these anomalies stem from. So get out your headphones, crank up the treble and follow along. Here we go...

0:05 - Click (just about the only non-mixing-related glitch in this song) from the drumsticks
0:34 - Stereo image wavers a bit before the actual panning begins in earnest
0:39-0:51 - The panning begins
1:10-1:16 - Clicks galore as the gong is panned from right to left
1:20-1:22 - Breathing, throat-clearing audiable in the right channel before the bass pedal obscures it
1:26 - Sudden burst of bleedthrough in the right channel just before the vocals start
1:46 - The word "done" can just barely be heard panning from the right to the left. The tail end of it finishes under "Then at last..." over to the left
1:58-2:01 - "Mildenhalllll..." pans over from left to right with accompanying clicks
2:00 - One of the voices saying "Mildenhall" (Roger) stops to take a breath before starting the whispery "now, now, now" vocals
2:13 - "Aware..." vocals pan from right to left again, except this time they drop out as well
2:25-2:28, 2:27 - "Waaaaake..." pans from left to right, Roger stops before the "Oh, my..."
2:37 - Rick sings "waiting" while Roger whispers "something". I originally didn't think this counted, but Radu C rightly points out that it sounds awkward enough to be a bona fide anomaly.
2:40 - "Me..." vocals pan from right to left as before. No drop-out this time, but there's a click over on the left
2:54-2:57, 2:56 - "Skyyyyyy..." pans from left to right, Roger stops before the "Oh, oh..."
3:04-3:06 - Roger flubs the whispered vocals here, inserting some random stuff over top of "I'll say..." as it pans from right to left
3:19-3:24 - "Flowwwwed...." pans from left to right, and the vocal track mercifully fades out
3:30-5:20 - More soft clicks and drop-outs as the instruments pan around the stereo image
4:00-5:05 - An entirely separate take of the song can be heard buzzing away in the left channel (likely overdubbed onto the now-free vocal track as an afterthought)
4:10 - Edit in the main take (listen to the cymbal crash here)
5:32 - Dave does something to his guitar that makes it sound like he dropped it on the ground, causing the song to end with a barely audiable crunch at the very end

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