The Piper at the Gates of Sqwawk (Score 5, Interesting)

I was in a band in the early 90's and we spent a fair bit of time on the road. My Walkman was my refuge from the droning sounds of the van and my bandmates. During one leg of a tour, we stopped at a used record shop (they had cassettes too!) and I picked up a used copy of Pink Floyd's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. I had never heard it before, but I knew it was Floyd's debut album, and was excited to hear the psychedelic strains of Syd Barrett. I popped the cassette into my Walkman, pressed play, and we were off to the next destination. The opening track started off with a sort of Hellish squeak - it sounded, conceivably, like those Gates opening into an ever-widening breach. The din persisted through the while song. I couldn't wait for that track to end.

However, the squeak from Hell kept going into track two. And three. By the time I got to the end of the first side, I kind of "got" it - the sound was a thematic element that tied the album together. The tape clicked to a halt, and I opened up the door to flip the cassette over. About that time, the drummer had taken his headphones off (everyone in the van was listening to their own music) and he said to me, "hey man, what the hell is wrong with your Walkman?" I then realized that the new aroma wafting through the van - intermixed with band BO, Dorito fumes, and probably no small measure of auto exhaust - was the smell of my Walkman motor burning up. The screeching noise was the last gasps of my Walkman, not Syd.