How Roger Waters Made a One-Man Animal Orchestra on 'Several Species of Small Furry Animals'

The most interesting thing about this Ummagumma freakout is that every sound – the chirps, clicks, frantic drumming, even the gibberish – came entirely from Roger Waters’ mouth and a few tape machines. No instruments, no samples. He recorded himself making random vocal noises, then sped them up, reversed them, and layered them into dense, squeaky loops. The “frantic percussion” is really just Waters tapping his teeth, clicking his tongue, and smacking his lips, all manipulated until they resemble a tiny jungle drum circle.

The “Pict” section arrives about three minutes in, when the noise suddenly clears and a calm, almost theatrical voice speaks in a thick Scottish brogue. That voice is Waters doing a deadpan lecture about the Picts – an ancient Celtic tribe that painted their bodies and lived in what is now Scotland. It’s a deliberately absurd contrast: after all the hyperactive animal chatter, a lone Pict seems to be explaining himself to the cave. The whole track was a test of how far tape editing and vocal layering could go, and it remains one of the weirdest four minutes in Pink Floyd’s catalog.