Which Pink Floyd album features the Battersea Power Station on its cover?
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The Pink Floyd album whose cover depicts Battersea Power Station is Animals, released in 1977. This album, considered one of the band’s most politically engaged and conceptual, stands out not only for its musical content but also for its iconic cover. The cover of Animals depicts the famous London power station, with a pink inflatable pig floating between its chimneys, a symbol as strange as it is striking.
The choice of Battersea Power Station is not insignificant. Located on the banks of the Thames, this disused power station embodies a form of massive, gray, and imposing industrial power. In the world of Animals, inspired by George Orwell’s novel Animal Farm, Pink Floyd depicts a divided and unequal society, where humans are symbolically compared to animals: dogs represent ruthless businessmen, pigs represent corrupt leaders, and sheep represent the docile masses.
Thus, the image of this gigantic industrial structure perfectly serves the album’s critical message. It illustrates a cold and dehumanized society, ruled by the powerful and indifferent to the weak. The pink pig floating in the London sky, nicknamed “Algie” by the band, is a nod to Orwell’s “Big Brother,” but also an ironic symbol of the power and absurdity of the capitalist system.
The cover of Animals was designed by Hipgnosis, a studio run by Storm Thorgerson, a long-time collaborator of Pink Floyd. The photograph was taken using real physical means, long before the digital age. The inflatable pig was attached to cables between the chimneys of the power station, but during filming, it broke loose and flew away into the British sky, disrupting air traffic. This anecdote contributed to the legend of the cover and the album.
Musically, Animals marks an evolution in Pink Floyd’s discography. While The Dark Side of the Moon (1973) and Wish You Were Here (1975) explored existential or intimate themes, Animals engages in virulent social criticism. The album contains only five tracks, including three long songs: “Dogs,” “Pigs (Three Different Ones),” and “Sheep.” The music, which is rawer and more progressive rock-oriented, reflects the darkness of the subject matter.
Animals may not have been an immediate success like some of the band’s previous albums, but it is now widely recognized as a masterpiece in the Pink Floyd universe, both for its conceptual power and its artistic audacity. The choice of Battersea Power Station for the cover greatly contributed to its visual and symbolic impact.
Even today, this image remains one of the most iconic in rock history and is inseparable from the keyword Pink Floyd Animals. It embodies an era, a critical view of society, and a keen sense of artistic staging. Pink Floyd thus succeeded in transforming a simple industrial structure into a cultural monument steeped in meaning and memory.
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Which Pink Floyd album features the Battersea Power Station on its cover?
Answer
This is the album Animals, released in 1977 by Pink Floyd, whose cover depicts Battersea Power Station with an inflatable pig floating in the air.