Pink Floyd Unveil 50th Anniversary Box Set For 'The Dark Side Of The Moon'

Pink Floyd have announced the 50th-anniversary box set commemorating their legendary 1973 album, The Dark Side Of The Moon, after teasing something Dark Side-related on social media this week. The re-release will be out on 24 March.

The box set is pretty epic. It contains the original album remastered by James Guthrie on both CD (gatefold sleeve with 12-page booklet) and vinyl (gatefold sleeve with original posters and stickers). It also features Blu-Ray discs and DVDs for audiophiles with Surround Sound, DTS, Dolby Atmos, and more. 

There are also two books: a 160-page hardcover book with rare black and white photographs from the 1973 & 1974 tours in the UK and US, with the band photographed by Peter Christopherson, Jill Furmanovsky, Aubrey Powell, and Storm Thorgerson, as well as a 76-page music book that's a songbook of the entire album. 

For the first time, fans can also listen to THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON LIVE AT WEMBLEY EMPIRE POOL, LONDON, 1974 on vinyl, but that has to be pre-ordered separately from the box set.

For replica collectors, the Dark Side Of The Moon box set also has two replicas of the 7" singles of Money with Any Colour You Like and Us And Them with Time. Pre-order the box set and check out other items here.

The box set arrives a month after the band added 18 previously unreleased live albums from the seminal Dark Side Of The Moon era, as well as an Alternative Tracks 1972 EP, to streaming services. 

The 18 live albums find Pink Floyd promoting their sixth and seventh albums, Meddle (1971) and Obscured By Clouds (1972), but more exciting, road-testing songs that would make up The Dark Side Of The Moon (1973). 

The Alternative Tracks EP comprises a trance remix of Any Colour You Like, a Speak To Me meets Breathe (In The Air) mash-up, an On The Run rough demo, and "ultra rare alternative versions" including another mash-up of Time and Breathe (In The Air), and a rare cut of Us And Them.

In April last year, Pink Floyd released their first song in 28 years.

David Gilmour and Nick Mason teamed up for Hey, Hey, Rise Up, raising funds for the Ukraine Humanitarian Fund. 

The song marks the band's first original music since The Division Bell's release in 1994. 

Gilmour and Mason wrote the track at the end of March, joined in the studio by bassist Guy Pratt and keyboardist Nitin Sawhney. 

“We, like so many, have been feeling the fury and the frustration of this vile act of an independent, peaceful democratic country being invaded and having its people murdered by one of the world's major powers," Gilmour said.

"I hope it will receive wide support and publicity. We want to raise funds for humanitarian charities and raise morale. We want to express our support for Ukraine and, in that way, show that most of the world thinks that it is totally wrong for a superpower to invade the independent democratic country that Ukraine has become.”