Inside ‘Music from The Body’: Roger Waters and Ron Geesin’s Wild 1970 Experiment

Music from The Body is the 1970 soundtrack to Roy Battersby’s documentary The Body, narrated by Vanessa Redgrave and Frank Finlay. The album was created by Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters and composer Ron Geesin, who also collaborated on Atom Heart Mother the same year. Known for its experimental edge, it uses “biomusic”—slaps, breathing, laughter, whispers, even flatulence—alongside traditional instruments like guitar, piano, and strings. The final track, “Give Birth to a Smile,” features all four members of Pink Floyd with Geesin on piano, though David Gilmour, Nick Mason, and Richard Wright went uncredited. The child heard on the opening track is Ron Geesin’s son, Joe. Uniquely, the LP was a complete re-recording with a different tracklist from the film’s soundtrack, and its cover featured a Transparent Anatomical Manikin. Waters wouldn’t release another album outside Pink Floyd until 1984’s The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking.