A Late Bloomer to Pink Floyd

I was in grade 9 when See Emily Play was on the airwaves. I didn’t mind that one. I never heard another Pink Floyd song until I was in university when Dark Side came out. I remember my cousin playing DSOTM for me and it just didn't excite me too much. Time was a curious novelty to me but the whole album seemed too “jazzy” to me at the time.

You'd think I would have been a big fan. I liked The Beatles, The Who, and The Moody Blues. Back then in my city there were only a couple of FM radio stations and I guess I listened more to the Top 40 AM station and did not hear much Pink Floyd. I guess I was more of a Top 40 hits guy, although Moody Blues certainly were not Top 40 material, more album oriented play.

Since listening to Dark Side of the Moon in 1973 I never bought a Pink Floyd album or even listened to one apart from the odd time a song would play on the radio and I would give it no heed. Until ……
I got my home theater set up with 5.1 surround sound in early 2009. I started buying a lot of concert videos. On a whim, when signing out videos from the local library, I signed out PULSE and watched that. I was enthralled. There was hardly a tune I did not like. This was Pink Floyd? I went out and bought the "Echoes” hits album right away. I have since bought the PULSE DVD and Davis Gilmour’s Remember the Night DVD. I have bought other Pink Floyd CDs and listen to Pink Floyd cycling to work most days and at night on my MP-3 player (esp. if my wife is snoring). In the last two years I have not played much else and have not tired of it. So I did not really grow up with Pink Floyd – I discovered all 14 albums in a space of a few weeks.

Is anyone else out there a Pink Floyd late bloomer like me?

I only became aware of Pink Floyd when the "Another Brick II" single was released. I was in grade 8 and thought he/they had a stupid name and I likely wouldn't like him/them. Then in high school, I got "Dark Side" and "The Wall" and was hooked.
Within a year I was an expert on "Relics", Wish...", "Animals", "Meddle", Atom Heart Mother, Ummagumma. And "The Final Cut" was the first album I was 'present' for upon release.
I guess you could call that "getting into them late", at least most of their stuff was already out by then, so I got the Pink Floyd story all out of sync and within a short period of time.
I always try to imagine a time when there was no Dark Side Of The Moon and who was actually following them and anticipating, say, Atom Heart Mother's release.