Released 5 August 1967 Length 3:21 | Recorded 21 May 1967 | |
Published Magdalene Music/Essex Music Genre Psychedelic rock, musique concrète Label EMI Columbia (UK)
Tower (US) | ||
"Bike" is a song by British rock band Pink Floyd, which is the final track featured on their 1967 debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn.
Contents
Information
In the song, Syd Barrett's lyrical subject shows a girl his bike (which he borrowed); a cloak; a homeless, aging mouse that he calls Gerald; and a clan of gingerbread men, because she "fits in with [his] world." With each repetition of the chorus, a sudden percussive noise is heard similar to the firing of two gunshots. Towards the end of the song, he offers to take her into a "room of musical tunes". The final verse is followed by an instrumental section that is a piece of musique concrète: a noisy collage of oscillators, clocks, gongs, bells, a violin, and other sounds edited with tape techniques, apparently the "other room" spoken of in the song and giving the impression of the turning gears of a bicycle. The ending of the song fades out with a tape loop of the band members laughing reversed and played at double speed. The song was written for Barrett's then girlfriend, Jenny Spires. She is also mentioned as "Jennifer Gentle" in the song "Lucifer Sam", which is also on The Piper at the Gates of Dawn.
Other album appearances
The song also appears on two Pink Floyd compilation albums: Relics (1971) and Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd (2001); it serves as the closing track on both albums.