"Dogs", originally composed as "You Gotta Be Crazy", is a song by the English progressive rock band Pink Floyd. It was released on the album Animals in 1977. Dogs are used to represent the megalomaniacal businessmen who destroy themselves and those around them by obsessing over their egos and their careers.

During the part which includes Rick Wright's synth solo, the sounds of dogs barking can be heard; this sound effect was created by processing the sound using a vocoder.

Guitarist David Gilmour and bassist Roger Waters share vocal duties in the song. Gilmour sings the majority of the song, but Waters takes over during the last two verses. On performances of the track on the band's 1977 "In the Flesh" tour, Gilmour would sing almost all of the song except for the last verse, use electric guitar for the whole track (instead of the acoustic guitars) and performed an extra guitar solo.

Concept

Dogs are used to represent the megalomaniacal businessmen who destroy themselves and those around them by obsessing over their egos and their careers. A number of comparisons are made and metaphors used to show how close these businessmen are with dogs, for example "Got to be able to pick out the easy meat with your eyes closed" the meat representing deals and opportunities for the businessmen. It is a long, increasingly haunting song at over seventeen minutes.

The final verse explores a number of aspects of business life and how it compares to dogs, for example taking chances and being trained "trained not to spit in the fan", losing their individuality "broken by trained personnel", obeying their superiors "fitted with collar and chain", getting treats for good behaviour "given a pat on the back", being better than everyone else "breaking away from the pack" and getting to know everyone but spending less time with family "only a stranger at home". Every line of this verse begins with the word "Who", which prompted comparison to Allen Ginsberg's poem Howl.

This song and the use of the word "Who" at the beginning of every line of the verse also illustrates the influence that Roy Harper had on the band. Roy Harper had used this technique on the song "The Lord's Prayer" from his 1973 Lifemask album, which included David Gilmour on guitar. Harper sang over 90 lines of a verse beginning with the words "whose" and "who". Roy Harper also sang on the song "Have A Cigar" from the "Wish You Were Here" album.

The song concludes with these "Dogs" working themselves to death until they are "found dead on the phone" having been dragged down by "the stone", a metaphor for "the weight they used to need to throw around".

Early versions

During their tour in 1974 Pink Floyd played three new songs in the first half of the shows, followed by the whole of the The Dark Side of the Moon album. Those three new songs were "You Gotta Be Crazy" (which would later become "Dogs"), "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" and "Raving And Drooling" (which would later become "Sheep").

During 1974 performances of "You Gotta Be Crazy", David Gilmour would sing the song in a faster speed than the versions on the 1975 US tour and the Animals album. "You Gotta Be Crazy" was about the problems one had to deal with in life. The lyrics were modified by the time the song was played live in 1975 and then the lyrics changed again when recording Animals.

Both "You Gotta Be Crazy" and "Raving And Drooling" were originally planned to be on the album following the tour Wish You Were Here, but the plans were changed (which later became a point of dispute between Gilmour and Waters, as an early sign of their later animosity) and they both ended up in different forms on Animals.

During live performances as part of Roger Waters' recent solo tours, he and the other musicians would play a hand of poker during the breakdown in the middle of the song. David Gilmour's vocal parts are sung by Jon Carin.

Trivia

• The acoustic guitar in the beginning of the song was played by Gilmour in D standard tuning, meaning the guitar strings would be tuned as DGCFAD.
• The main guitar solos are performed on two guitars harmonising, in the original recording both of these were played by David Gilmour and then played over one another.
• The acoustic guitar and dog barking section of the song was featured on the TV show WKRP in Cincinnati on the episode "Turkeys Away".
• David Gilmour's use of effects on this album, especially on the solo in this song, demonstrate a guitar player's technique of getting a "wet" or ambient sound from the instrument. The attack in his playing emphasizes the wetness of the chorus or phasing sounds.
• David Gilmour Used Fender Telecaster Guitar playing through a Electro Harmonix Big Muff into a Yamaha RA-200 Rotating speaker for the first guitar solo of Dogs.

Cover Version

• A cover of "Dogs" by Los Angeles based Pink Floyd tribute band Which One's Pink? appears on 2003 Pink Floyd tribute album A Fair Forgery of Pink Floyd

Personnel

• Roger Waters - Bass guitar, vocals
• David Gilmour - Vocals, acoustic and Fender Telecaster electric guitars
• Richard Wright - Fender-Rhodes piano, Hammond organ, Mini-Moog Synthesizers, ARP String Synthesizer, backing vocals
• Nick Mason - drums, percussion

Sample

External links

• Dogs Lyrics
• You Gotta Be Crazy

References