Pink Floyd
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This Pink Floyd trivia quiz runs from the UFO Club to Live 8 and beyond in 49 free questions with answers: the two bluesmen behind the name, Syd Barrett's brief brilliant reign and his ghostly studio visit in 1975, the cow, the prism and the pig, Clare Torry's £30 vocal, the cash-register loops in Money, the Battersea pig that closed Heathrow, the Montreal spitting incident that became The Wall, Wright's firing, Waters' walkout and the court fight over the name, the Division Bell heads outside Ely, Stephen Hawking's cameo, the Hyde Park reunion and the 2022 song for Ukraine. About a third of the questions are ones any fan can answer; the rest are for people who know their Ummagumma from their Obscured by Clouds. It works for a music-round at quiz night, a listening party, or a solo test with headphones on. Every answer has been checked against a reference source, and each question shows its explanation and citation once you have answered.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Pink Floyd took their name from two American musicians who played which style of music?
Blues
Blues: the band's co-founder combined the first names of two Carolina bluesmen, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council.
Q 02In which city was Pink Floyd formed in 1965?
London
London: Waters and Mason lodged with a Highgate tutor who built light machines, and the band even played gigs as Leonard's Lodgers.
Q 03Which guitarist did Pink Floyd bring in as a fifth member in December 1967, months before their frontman left?
David Gilmour
David Gilmour, a childhood friend of the frontman, was brought in to cover for him on stage, and by early 1968 the frontman was out.
Q 04What was Pink Floyd's first single, released in March 1967?
Arnold Layne
Arnold Layne was based on a real thief who stole women's underwear from the washing lines where the band members' mothers housed student lodgers.
Q 05The album title The Piper at the Gates of Dawn comes from a chapter of which children's book?
The Wind in the Willows
The Wind in the Willows: in chapter seven, Rat and Mole search for a missing baby otter and find him asleep at the hooves of the god Pan.
Q 06Recording their 1967 debut album, Pink Floyd worked down the hall from which band making a landmark album?
The Beatles
The Beatles were making Sgt. Pepper next door, and Pink Floyd were invited in to watch them record 'Lovely Rita'.
Q 07After leaving Pink Floyd in 1968, the band's original frontman eventually retreated to which English city?
Cambridge
Cambridge: he moved back in with his mother, painted and gardened for decades, and preferred to be called by his real first name, Roger.
Q 08What is on the cover of the band's 1970 album Atom Heart Mother?
A cow in a field
A cow in a field: not even the band could say what the album was about, so the designers put a cow on the cover.
Q 09The title Atom Heart Mother was taken from a newspaper story about what?
A nuclear-powered pacemaker
A nuclear-powered pacemaker fitted to a woman made the Evening Standard headline 'Atom Heart Mother Named', just as the band needed a title for a BBC broadcast.
Q 10What does the cover of Pink Floyd's 1971 album Meddle show?
An ear underwater
An ear underwater: designer Storm Thorgerson had first pitched a close-up of a baboon's backside, but the band overruled him.
Q 11The Meddle track "Seamus" features what unusual guest performer?
A howling dog
The howling dog was Seamus, belonging to Humble Pie singer Steve Marriott, and a band member was dog-sitting him during the sessions.
Q 12Which Pink Floyd epic is split in two to open and close their 1972 concert film shot in an empty Roman amphitheatre?
Echoes
Echoes: director Adrian Maben chose the setting after losing his passport in the ruins and going back alone to look for it.
Q 13Which EMI staff engineer engineered The Dark Side of the Moon at Abbey Road?
Alan Parsons
Alan Parsons had heard session singer Clare Torry on a covers album and brought her in to sing on 'The Great Gig in the Sky'.
Q 21On the Wish You Were Here cover, what is happening to one handshaking businessman?
He is on fire
He is on fire: stuntman Ronnie Rondell Jr. really was set alight, and after 15 takes came away with a singed moustache.
Q 22The 1977 album Animals is loosely based on which book?
Animal Farm
Animal Farm: Waters cast society as dogs, pigs and sheep, and for the cover the band flew a giant inflatable pig over Battersea Power Station.
Q 23The inflatable pig photographed over Battersea Power Station for Animals was nicknamed what?
Algie
The pig, nicknamed Algie, broke loose in December 1976, drifted into Heathrow's flight path and came down in a Kent field, alarming a farmer's cows.
Q 14Which design group created the prism cover of Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon?
Hipgnosis
Hipgnosis, run by Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell, offered the band several designs, and all four members chose the prism.
Q 15Pink Floyd's 'Money' is written mostly in which unusual time signature?
7/4
7/4, though some accounts give 7/8; its beat is set by a seven-part loop spliced from recordings of coins, a cash register and tearing paper.
Q 16How much was Clare Torry originally paid for her vocal on "The Great Gig in the Sky"?
£30
£30, the standard fee for a Sunday session; Clare Torry sued in 2004, and the song now credits her as co-writer.
Q 17Which track opens The Dark Side of the Moon?
Speak to Me
Speak to Me is credited to Nick Mason alone; Mason says he made it himself, while Waters has called the credit a gift he later regretted.
Q 18Fans claim The Dark Side of the Moon syncs up with which classic film when the two are played together?
The Wizard of Oz
The Wizard of Oz: fans call the pairing Dark Side of the Rainbow, but Roger Waters has dismissed the sync as coincidence.
Q 19"Shine On You Crazy Diamond" from Wish You Were Here is a tribute to which former bandmate?
Syd Barrett
Syd Barrett, the band's co-founder, is its subject, and when he turned up at Abbey Road while they were recording it in June 1975, at first nobody recognised him.
Q 20Who sang lead vocals on Pink Floyd's 'Have a Cigar'?
Roy Harper
Roy Harper, recording his own album at Abbey Road at the time, sang it, and Waters later said he regretted asking him because Harper played it for laughs.
Q 24An incident at a 1977 concert in which city, when Waters spat at a fan, inspired The Wall?
Montreal
At Montreal's Olympic Stadium, Waters leaned over and spat at a noisy fan, then was so shocked at himself that he began imagining a wall between band and audience.
Q 25The children's chorus on "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)" came from where?
Islington Green School
Islington Green School's pupils got no royalties at the time, but decades later former choir members lodged a claim for the unpaid money.
Q 26Which band member was fired during The Wall, then rehired as a salaried player for the tour?
Richard Wright
Richard Wright stayed on as a hired hand, and as the tour lost money he was probably the only member who made any from it.
Q 27Pink Floyd's The Wall topped the US chart but peaked at number three in which country?
The UK
The UK: at home The Wall stalled at number three, even though 'Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)' went to number one.
Q 28Who played Pink in the 1982 film Pink Floyd – The Wall?
Bob Geldof
Bob Geldof, the Boomtown Rats singer, got the part after Waters, originally meant to play Pink himself, was dropped following poor screen tests.
Q 29Who created the animation for The Wall film and its marching hammers?
Gerald Scarfe
Gerald Scarfe clashed so often with Waters and director Alan Parker that he admitted carrying a bottle of whiskey to fortify himself each morning.
Q 30Which war prompted Roger Waters to rewrite Pink Floyd's 1983 album The Final Cut as an anti-war concept album?
The Falklands War
The Falklands War: Waters saw Thatcher's response as pointless, and dedicated the album to his father, killed in Italy in 1944.