I gotta admit, the first time I heard TFC I was wondering where Gilmours' vocals were. The mainstream would probably have gone for it more. Gilmours' production would have leaned more mainstream, too. Waters is a personal artist and I admire that he doesn't 'water down' his work to please radio programmers and the casual fans. Gilmour just naturally has a mainstream approach and so I don't think he waters it down either, it's just what he likes. I am glad they followed the Wall with a small, personal record. One more smash hit like The Wall and they would be so popular we'd hate 'em or something. TFC can be a little dull in some places but I really like tracks 2,4,5,10,11,&12.
As for Momentary Lapse, well, I bitch about what has become of the floyd all the way through it so I only hear the first minute and a half of each song. I never should have read that lyric sheet.