When it was originally released in 1978, credited to Richard Wright, Wet Dream was largely ignored by all but the most hardcore Pink Floyd fans. That’s a pity because plenty of the keyboard player and sometime vocalist’s debut solo album has much in common with so many familiar songs. Scattered throughout are numerous Floydian references including the uplifting chorus of Echoes, The Great Gig In The Sky’s gentle chordal embrace, and the doppler-shift notes Wright added so effectively to Dogs.
This musical déjà vu is no surprise, given his musical identity and harmonic sensibilities were an integral component of what made Floyd interesting. But his regular band were more than just a sonic presence. When Wright, always the most diffident of vocalists, plaintively sings, ‘Something’s gotta give, we can’t carry on like this/One year on and more, unsure where do we go from here?’ on the stately Summer Elegy, he could be describing life inside Floyd rather than the deterioration of his marriage at the time.
