"Your Possible Pasts" (mislabeled as "Your Impossible Pasts" on a radio promo single) is a song from

Pink Floyd Pink Floyd are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1965. Gaining an early following as one of the first British psychedelic music, psychedelic groups, they were distinguished by their extended compositions, sonic experiments ...

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

album '' The Final Cut''. This song was one of several to be considered for the band's "best of" album, '' Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd''.

Background

The song, like many others on ''The Final Cut'', is a rewritten version of a song rejected for '' The Wall'', originally to be used in ''Spare Bricks'' (an early version of ''The Final Cut'' that was an extension of ''The Wall''.) Guitarist David Gilmour objected to the use of these previously rejected tracks, as he believed that they weren't good enough for release: Despite not appearing on ''The Wall'' album, the lyrics of the chorus did appear in the film for said album, ''

Pink Floyd – The Wall ''Pink Floyd – The Wall'' is a 1982 British live-action/animated musical surrealist drama film directed by Alan Parker, based on Pink Floyd's 1979 studio album '' The Wall''. The screenplay was written by Pink Floyd vocalist and bassist ...

'', where the lyrics were read by the main character, Pink, in-between the songs " Waiting for the Worms" and " Stop". "Your Possible Pasts" also appeared on a 12-inch promotional single entitled ''Selections from The Final Cut'', with " The Final Cut" on the B-side. However, despite not being released as a commercial single, the song did receive significant radio play, resulting in the song hitting number 8 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart in America.

Lyrics

The first verse describes poppies entwining with "cattle trucks lying in wait for the next time", an allusion to the railway vehicles used in

The Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

. The line "Do you remember me, how we used to be?" originally appeared in the song "Incarceration of a Flower Child", written by Waters in 1968. Neither Pink Floyd nor Waters recorded the song; however, it was recorded by Marianne Faithfull in 1999 for her album '' Vagabond Ways''.

Reception

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

'' critic Stewart Mason said of the song: Chris Ott of ''Pitchfork Media'' described the song as:

Personnel

Roger Waters George Roger Waters (born 6 September 1943) is an English musician and singer-songwriter. In 1965, he co-founded the rock band Pink Floyd as the bassist. Following the departure of the group's main songwriter Syd Barrett in 1968, Waters became ...

– bass guitar, acoustic guitar, tape effects, sound effects, and vocals * David Gilmour – electric guitars * Nick Mason – drums with: * Michael Kamen – electric piano and orchestrations * Andy Bown –

Hammond organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert, first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding #Drawbars, drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, sound was created ...

Ray Cooper Raymond Cooper (born 19 September 1947) is an English musician who has worked as a session and road-tour percussionist. During his career, Cooper has worked and toured with numerous musically diverse bands and artists including Elton John (as ...

– percussion

References

Bibliography

* {{Authority control 1983 songs Pink Floyd songs Anti-war songs British hard rock songs Songs written by Roger Waters Song recordings produced by Roger Waters