In the 2003 documentary The Making of the Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason acknowledged Menon’s outsized influence on the album’s success. “The story in America was a disaster, in that we really hadn’t sold records,” he said at the time. “And so they brought in a man called Bhaskar Menon who was absolutely terrific. He decided he was going to make this work, and make the American company sell [Dark Side of the Moon]. And he did.” Born Vijaya Bhaskar Menon in Thiruvanthapuram, India, on May 29, 1934, to father KRK — a notable civil servant who would go on to serve as India’s first Finance Minister — and mother Saraswathi, Menon would form a love of music via the Indian ragas his mother played in their home growing up. After earning his master’s degree f...