Pink Floyd - The Story
Learn the complete history of one of the most important bands in music, from its beginnings, members, problems between its members and today.
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Syd barret
Roger Keith Barrett, known as Syd Barrett, was the frontman, singer, guitarist and songwriter for the English band Pink Floyd on their first successful album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1967). Three years after the founding of Pink Floyd, Barrett left the band due to problems with drugs, especially LSD, and attempted a brief solo career that resulted in two albums, after which he retired, retiring since then in the his mother's house. Pink Floyd survived their loss, but Barrett's mental illness had a profound effect on the lyrics of their new leaders, Roger Waters, and Barrett's guitar replacement, David Gilmour, reaching their greatest hits under his baton (Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here, Animals and The Wall) with themes often inspired by the disintegration of their former leader.
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02
The Pink Floyd
The name had been proposed by Barrett and taken from two old blues musicians he admired: Pink Anderson and Floyd Council. The Sound faded fairly quickly, but the The would be used regularly until 1968. The band's English productions during the Syd Barrett era were credited as The Pink Floyd as well as their first two singles in the US. David Gilmour continued to refer to the group as The Pink Floyd until 1984.
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THE BEGINNING
1964 to 1967
Pink Floyd emerged in 1964 from a band called Sigma 6, which successively changed their name to T-Set, Megadeaths, The Screaming Abdabs, The Architectural Abdabs, and The Abdabs. When the band broke up, some of its members (guitarists Bob Klose and Roger Waters, drummer Nick Mason, and keyboardist Rick Wright) formed a new band called The Tea Set. After a brief stint with Chris Dennis as lead vocalist, guitarist and vocalist Syd Barrett, a fan of The Beatles and rhythm and blues, joined the band, whereupon Waters went on to play bass. In the summer of 1965, Bob Klose was forced to leave the band under pressure from his parents and university professors, and the group became a quartet, with Barrett, Waters, Wright and Mason. In this way, Barrett was revealed as the main songwriter of the group, and soon began to write new songs with influences from Bo Diddley's rhythm and blues, 14 although the publication of Eight Miles High by the Californians The Byrds and especially the album Revolver of their countrymen the Beatles in 1966 caused the rise of psychedelic rock, a then new musical genre that impacted the band and in which Barrett felt more comfortable.
In the autumn of that same year, Tea Set coincided in a concert in Northolt, on the outskirts of London, with a band with the same name that was going to perform in the same place. For a short period the name oscillated between Tea Set and The Pink Floyd Sound, but over time the latter became prevalent. The name had been proposed by Barrett and taken from two old blues musicians he admired: Pink Anderson and Floyd Council. The Sound faded fairly quickly, but the The would be used regularly until 1968. The band's English productions during the Syd Barrett era were credited as The Pink Floyd as well as their first two singles in the US. David Gilmour continued to refer to the group as The Pink Floyd until 1984.
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Pink Floyd became one of the underground movement's favorite bands, playing venues like the UFO Club, the Marquee Club, and The Roundhouse. At the end of 1966 the band was invited to compose music for Peter Whitehead's film, Tonite Let's All Make Love in London, and was filmed recording two songs ("Interstellar Overdrive" and "Nick's Boogie") in January 1967. Although they appeared very few samples of this music in the film, the session was released as London 1966/1967 in 2005.
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Given their growing popularity, the band members decided to form Blackhill Enterprises in October 1966, in association with their managers Peter Jenner and Andrew King, 18 to distribute the singles "Arnold Layne" in March 1967 and "See Emily Play." in June of the same year. The former climbed to # 20 on the UK hit chart, 1 and the latter peaked at # 6.19 giving the group the opportunity to appear for the first time on national television on the Top of the Pops program. July 1967.
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Sigma 6 in 1964
Tea Set
FIRST STEPS AND
THE EXPERIMENTATION
First steps (1967-1968)
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In 1967, after several instrumental sessions and live performances, Pink Floyd decided to make their first album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, which was released in August 1967. The title was taken from the novel The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame. It is currently considered the quintessential example of British psychedelic music, 22 in addition to being very well received by critics at the time. The album's tracks, predominantly written by Barrett, feature poetic lyrics and an eclectic mix of music, from the avant-garde 'Interstellar Overdrive' to 'The Scarecrow' (inspired by the folk music of The Fens, a rural region north of Cambridge in Cambridge). where Barrett, Gilmour and Waters originate). The lyrics are totally surreal and often folkloric, like "The Gnome." The music reflected the best electronic technology of the time, highlighting the use of stereo panning, tape editing, tape echo effects, and the use of electronic keyboards, notably the Farfisa organ played by Wright. The album was a success in the United Kingdom, where it reached number 6, but did not do so well in the United States, on whose charts it only reached 131st position, although it would later be re-released in the period of commercial success of the album. group, in the decade of the 70. During this period, the band undertook a tour with Jimi Hendrix, which helped to increase their popularity.
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As the band's success grew, stress and drug use (especially LSD) took their toll on Syd Barrett's mental health. His behavior became increasingly unpredictable, affecting the group's public performances as Barrett was often unable to play guitar or even sing. For this reason, in December 1967 the group contacted a musician friend of Barrett who frequented the band's concerts, David Gilmour, to support him on the guitar and sing when he suffered any of his mental blocks, although the candidacy of Barrett was also considered. Jeff Beck. However, this solution was not practical and the other members simply stopped wearing it to concerts. Barrett's last concert in the group was on January 20, 1968, at Hastings Pier. The rest of the members hoped that Barrett could write for the band with Gilmour at concerts, but this did not happen, and Barrett's compositions became increasingly difficult and abstract, such as "Have You Got It, Yet? », With changes of melodies and harmonic progressions, which made the rest of the members scrap the agreement. Barrett's departure became official on April 6, 1968, and producers Jenner and King decided to follow him, so the Blackhill partnership disbanded. The band adopted Steve O'Rourke as manager, who would continue with Pink Floyd until his death in 2003.
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After the release of two solo albums (The Madcap Laughs and Barrett) in 1970 (co-produced by and sometimes with collaborations with Gilmour, Waters and Wright), of moderate success, Barrett retired to his native Cambridge and led a quiet life until his death on July 7, 2006.
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The age of experimentation (1969-1972)
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Without Barrett's presence in the line-up, Gilmour, Waters and Wright took over the creative reins of the group, each contributing their voice and sound in their new productions, but giving the new materials less consistency than in the Barrett era. . Syd Barrett had been the lead performer for the early years, in the following era Gilmour, Wright, and especially Waters became the main songwriters and voices within the band. Some of the group's more experimental compositions date from this time, such as "A Saucerful of Secrets" —which consists mostly of noise, sound effects, percussions, oscillators, and tape loops— or "Careful with That Ax, Eugene."
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Although Barrett had written most of the first album, only one composition of his, "Jugband Blues," appeared on the second Pink Floyd album. Barrett also participated in the songs "Remember a Day" (recorded during the sessions of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn) and "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun". The new album, A Saucerful of Secrets, released in June 1968, reached ninth place in the UK and became the only Pink Floyd album not to make the American charts. Somewhat irregular due to Barrett's departure, the album still contained much of the psychedelic sound that its former leader had impressed on it, combined with a more experimental style, which would reach its full development on Ummagumma. It is important to mention that "A Saucerful of Secrets", also became the only album of the band that had the participation of all five members. The twelve-minute-long title track is close to the epic, slow songs to come, but the album was coldly received by critics of the time, though not by today's critics. Future Pink Floyd works would embrace this idea more firmly, focusing more on songwriting with each new release.
Shortly after, they were called in by director Barbet Schroeder to compose the soundtrack for the film More, which would be released in May 1969. Their compositions were released two months later as a Pink Floyd studio album, Music from the Film More, and they reached ninth in the UK and 153rd in the US Critics defined this record as uneven and bumpy.36 Many More tracks (as fans often call it) are acoustic folk songs.
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Previously, the band had been working on a rock opera called The Man / The Journey, but the project was rejected. However, two of the songs that made up this work, "Green Is the Color" and "Cymbaline", were included in More, 9 and remained a regular part of concerts at that time. "Cymbaline" was also the first Pink Floyd song to express Roger Waters' cynical attitude toward the music industry explicitly. The remainder of the album consists of avant-garde side pieces included on the soundtrack (some of which also feature on The Man / The Journey), with a few more powerful songs, such as "The Nile Song."
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The next work of the band was a double album entitled Ummagumma, which consists of a live album (recorded between Birmingham and Manchester) and another with new studio songs. Each of these tracks was composed by one of the band members and occupies half a side of each album (about 10 minutes each) .38 The title of this album means "sexual relationship" in Cambridge slang. . The studio album is purely experimental, with a long folk-style theme ("Grantchester Meadows," composed by Waters), pianistic and atonal "Sysyphus," flirtations with progressive rock on "The Narrow Way," and long drum solos. at "The Grand Vizier's Garden Party." Finally, "Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict" is a five-minute song that features only Waters' voice singing at different speeds, resulting in a sound similar to that of birds and rodents. . Several of the new songs on this album had already been performed at the concert recorded under the name The Man / The Journey. Ummagumma was the band's most successful album to date, peaking at No. 5 in the UK and 74 in the US.
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The arrival of world fame (1973-1975)
The following publication, Meddle (1971) , ended up cementing the path that the band would take towards progressive Rock. The 23-minute song "Echoes" was described by Waters as a "sonic poem" due to its constant sound effects, and is considered one of his best pieces, as it contains long and unnerving instrumental lapses that fully demonstrate Gilmour's talent on guitar, Mason on drums and Wright on the Hammond Organ. In this sense, the orchestra that had so much prominence in Atom Heart Mother was put aside to give way to improvisations and studio experimentation. Shortly before the release of this album in 1971, the band stated in an interview that by this time the quality and sound of their performances had no secrets (such as those that claimed they required a large number of sound engineers), more than the 4 instruments that each of them mastered. Meddle reached the third position in the United Kingdom, but the lack of publicity on the part of Capitol Records in the United States caused that in this country it only reached 70th.
The next work of the band was Obscured by Clouds (1972) , recorded in France, and that formed the soundtrack of the film The Valley of Barbet Schroeder. It became the first top 50 for Pink Floyd in the US, as well as reaching sixth place in the UK. The lyrics to the song "Free Four" were the first reference in a song to Waters' father's death in World War II, a theme that became a recurring theme in later work. Furthermore, the song "Childhood's End" was Gilmour's last lyrical contribution in fifteen years, and is based on the book of the same name by Arthur C. Clarke. Stylistically, it is an album slightly different from its predecessor, Meddle, with shorter songs and with the reduction of the use of sound effects to create atmospheres, bordering on blues rock, folk rock or soft rock in many cases.
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During this time, Pink Floyd distanced itself from psychedelia and became a difficult band to classify. The different styles of each of the composers came together in a unique one, which crystallized in the two most important works of their discography, for critics and audiences: The Dark Side of the Moon (1973) and Wish You Were Here (1975) . In both works, Gilmour became the main vocalist of the formation, while the feminine choirs and the saxophone of Dick Parry acquired special relevance. This time became the creative zenith of the band, since both in Dark Side and in Wish you Were Here the 4 members carried out the composition of great songs like Time, in whose creation even Mason was involved. According to Gilmour, there was a kind of "consensus" among the 4 in that Waters was the main writer of the songs while the musical composition fell mainly on Wright and him.
The release of the hit The Dark Side of the Moon in 1973 marked a turning point in the band's popularity. Pink Floyd had stopped releasing singles since 1968, when "Point Me at the Sky" was released; However, "Money" broke this trend and reached 20th place in the US The album, meanwhile, became the band's first number one in this country, becoming one of the best-selling albums on the US. history of the United States by surpassing fifteen million copies, and one of the best sellers in the world, with more than forty million. In addition, it remained on the Billboard 200 for 741 weeks, a record at that time, including 591 consecutive from 1976 to 1988, which meant another record; It is estimated that around one in four British families owns a copy of the disc in one of its formats. It also stayed on the UK charts for 301 weeks, though it never surpassed second place.
It can be classified as the first fully conceptual album developed by the band, in which themes such as the meaning of living (Breathe), everyday stress (On the Run), the irremediable passage of time (Time), and death (The Great Gig in the Sky). In this album the saxophone acquires a very important role, expressing the influences of jazz, especially visible in Wright, which, together with the prominence of the female choir, helps to diversify the texture of the album. Throughout this, excerpts from interviews with some of the group's assistants played in the background are heard several times. The lyrics and the sound of the album try to describe in some way the pressures that the human being suffers throughout its existence. Its cover, which represents the phenomenon of light scattering in a prism, was devised by Storm Thorgerson and Audrey Powell.
Wish You Were Here , published in 1975, is about the absence of human feelings in the world of the music industry, as well as the longing for former band member Syd Barrett. Known mainly for the homonymous theme, the album also contains an extensive 26-minute song divided into nine parts and two tracks entitled "Shine on You Crazy Diamond", a tribute to Barrett in which the lyrics expressly deal with the consequences of his departure. of the group. Many of the band's past influences were mixed into this song, which ends with a reference to one of the early singles from Pink Floyd's discography, "See Emily Play." The rest of the songs, "Welcome to the Machine" and "Have a Cigar" (sung by Roy Harper), exhibit, as they say, a strong criticism of the industrialization of music. Wish You Were Here was the first album to reach No. 1 in the UK and US, and was just as critically praised as The Dark Side of the Moon.
During the recordings of the album Wish You Were Here a famous anecdote for the band occurred: Someone, for some strange reason, told Syd Barrett to attend Abbey Road Studios because Pink Floyd was recording a new album. On June 5, 1975, a fat man, with his head and eyebrows completely shaved, arrived at the Abbey Road studio while the members of the group were mixing "Shine on You Crazy Diamond." Nobody was able to recognize it, until suddenly one of them realized that it was Syd Barrett himself. Asked about his uncanny plumpness, Barrett said he had been eating too many pork chops.55 In a 2001 BBC interview to film the documentary Syd Barrett: Crazy Diamond, Wright said:
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"One thing that really remains in my memory, that I will never forget; it happened in the sessions of 'Shine On'. I came to the studio and saw that man sitting in the back of the studio, he was as far away as you are from me. I recognized him. I said 'Who is this guy behind you?' 'That's Syd.' And I just fell apart, I couldn't believe it ... He had shaved all his hair ... I mean, up to his eyebrows, everything ... He was going up and down, making noise with his teeth , it was awful. And, uh, I was, I mean, Roger was crying, I think so was I; we were both crying. It was very shocking ... seven years without contact, and it came then, when we are doing that song in I don't know, coincidence, karma, destiny, who knows? But it was very, very, very powerful. "
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In the same documentary, Nick Mason said: " When I think about it, I can still see his eyes, but ... everything was different." Waters also intervened in the interview: "I had no idea who he was for a long time," as well as Gilmour: "None of us recognized him. Shaved ... bald head shaved, and very fat."
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ERA WATERS
(1976-1983)
With the publication of Animals in January 1977 , the band's music began to be criticized by fans of punk rock for having become too pretentious, having lost sight of the simplicity of rock and roll. However, Animals is considered to be a more guitar-making work than previous ones, partly due to the influence of the emerging punk movement and the fact that it was recorded at Pink Floyd's new studios, Britannia Row. It was the first record that did not include any Rick Wright compositions, and it peaked at No. 2 in the UK and No. 3 in the US.
As in many of its predecessors, Animals has several songs related to each other by the same theme, in this case inspired by the novel Rebellion on the farm by George Orwell. On the album, the songs "Sheep", "Pigs" or "Dogs" are used as metaphors for contemporary society. In this metaphor, the dogs ("Dogs") are the bosses of the industry, the pigs ("Pigs") represent the British political class of that time, indirectly alluding to figures such as Margaret Thatcher, and the sheep ("Sheep ») Represent the rest of the inhabitants, who let themselves be carried away by dogs and pigs without rebelling. Despite the leading role of the guitar, keyboards and synthesizers still play an important role in Animals, but Dick Parry's signature saxophone and female backing vocals disappeared from the compositions. Many critics did not respond well to the album, calling it "tedious" and "bleak."
The album cover features an inflatable pig, nicknamed "Algie" by the band members, flying over the chimneys of London's Battersea Power Station. However, the wind that was blowing on the day the photograph was taken made it difficult to control the balloon, and the photo of the pig and the photo of the power station had to be superimposed using a photo montage. This pig became one of the symbols of the band, and remained as one more part of the group's live shows.
After the Animals promotion tour, each of the members of Pink Floyd embarked on individual projects. Gilmour recorded and released the David Gilmour album in 1978, the same year Rick Wright released Wet Dream, and Nick Mason briefly worked on the production of Steve Hillage's (Gong member) Steve Hillage album. The only one who was not distracted from the Pink Floyd activity was Roger Waters, who worked on two different projects: The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking and The Wall. The rest of the members chose the latter as the next album, and Pros and Cons would later become Waters' first solo album.
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In early 1979 an economic scandal involving the Northon Warburg company came to light: its top leader, Andrew Warburg, had been diverting funds for a series of illicit operations and fled England; being arrested on his return in 1982. This company was the one that managed the income of the members of Pink Floyd, who saw how between the four they had lost more than a million pounds sterling. As a result of the scandal, each of them owed a lot of tax money, and they were forced to leave the country between April 6, 1979 and April 6, 1980.
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During the exile the album The Wall, which was recorded in France, was finished polishing.
The Wall and the departure of Richard Wright
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The epic rock opera The Wall was released in 1979. Composed almost entirely by Waters, it deals with the themes of loneliness and lack of communication, expressed through the metaphor of a wall, built between the musician and the audience. Waters devised this format when he spat at a fan who had not stopped berating the group at a concert in Montreal, Canada.61 68 The Wall brought Pink Floyd back to the top of the charts with the single "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II "(the 340,000 copies distributed in the United Kingdom were sold in only five days) also extracting other hits such as" Comfortably Numb "or" Run Like Hell ", which became classics of the band and of radio stations despite never being published as singles.
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The album was produced by Bob Ezrin, a friend of Waters' who shared the songwriting credits on "The Trial" (although he would later break their relationship when Ezrin revealed the concert show to the press).
Waters imposed his artistic gifts and his leadership on the band, using the precarious economic situation of the band in his favor, which immediately led to numerous conflicts between the members. Wright's influence was downplayed, and he was fired during the recording by Waters, although he ended up returning for live concerts at a specified salary. Interestingly, it was this situation that made Wright the only musician who made any money from The Wall concerts. The opera was only performed on a few occasions due to logistical complications (since in these performances a wall was built in the breaks of each performance), 1 although it would be performed by Waters once more after the fall of the Berlin Wall. .
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Although it never reached number one in the UK (it only reached third place), The Wall remained fifteen weeks at number one on the US charts. It was acclaimed by critics, and went 23 platinum records, selling 11.5 million copies in the US.
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As a sequel, the movie Pink Floyd - The Wall was released in 1982, the soundtrack of which is made up of most of The Wall's content. The film, written by Waters and directed by Alan Parker, stars The Boomtown Rats founder Bob Geldof, who re-recorded many of the album's original vocal parts. The animation was carried out by Gerald Scarfe. The song "When the Tigers Broke Free", which first appeared in this film, was released as a limited edition single, although it became popular when it was included in the compilation Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd and the reissue of The Final Cut. Another original song from the film is "What Shall We Do Now?" Which was removed from the original album due to time constraints on vinyl records. The only songs on The Wall that were not used were "Hey You" and "The Show Must Go On."
The Falklands War was one of the new themes incorporated into the lyrics of The Final Cut, which reaffirmed Roger Waters' anti-war stance.
The Final Cut , an album dedicated to the memory of Waters' father, Eric Fletcher Waters, who was killed in combat in World War II, 74 was released in 1983. It is the band's only album on which Richard Wright did not appear. , and the only one that was composed in its entirety by one of the members of the band, in this case Waters (so much so that they offered to publish it as a solo album, something that was rejected by the rest of the members and by EMI) . It was also he himself who recorded almost all the vocal parts, except for a song in which he is accompanied by Gilmour.
The theme of the work followed the line of the previous ones, although in a darker way. In it, Waters included for the first time in the lyrics the British participation in the Falklands War, and concluded with a reference to a possible nuclear war, in the song "Two Suns in the Sunset". The orchestral arrangements were performed by Michael Kamen, who, along with Andy Bown, performed the keyboard parts due to Wright's absence.
The Final Cut was well received by critics, reaching No. 1 in the UK and No. 6 in the US It contains a minor radio hit, "Not Now John," the only one of the work in which Gilmour sings. This situation provoked numerous arguments between Gilmour and Waters, of such magnitude that it was rumored that they did not see each other in the studio during the recording sessions. While Gilmour said he tried to keep making good music, Waters stated that no one understood the social message his songs contained. Although there was never any promotional tour for this album, Waters has since performed a few songs at his solo concerts.
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After this album the compilation Works was published, which included for the first time the unreleased song "Embryo", recorded in 1970. From then on, each of the members took different paths, embarking on their own projects. Gilmour released the solo album About Face in March 1984. A month later, Wright joined Dave Harris of the group Fashion to form Zee, which released the Identity album. In May 1984, Waters released The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking, a concept album he had come up with during the 1978 hiatus. A year after these releases, Mason released Profiles along with 10cc's Rick Fenn, which contains a collaboration by Gilmour and UFO keyboardist Danny Peyronel.
THE GILMOUR ERA
(1985-1995)
In December 1985, Waters announced the separation of Pink Floyd , describing the band as an "exhausted force". However, in 1986 Gilmour and Mason began recording a new album under the name Pink Floyd. A bitter legal dispute led Roger to claim that the Pink Floyd name should have been dropped, but Gilmour and Mason maintained their intention to record under that name, stating that it was they who had the legal rights because Waters had left. the band on their own initiative. Eventually, the lawsuit was brought to court, and the rights were acquired by Gilmour and Mason.
After shuffling various titles, the new album was released as A Momentary Lapse of Reason , and reached # 3 in the US and UK. Without Waters, who had been the main compositional engine at the lyrical level, the band relied on external lyricists, drawing criticism from some purists.
Bob Ezrin acted as a co-producer along with Jon Carin, and both contributed compositions to the work. Carin also performed most of the keyboard parts despite Wright's return, 79 which was initially made a salaried musician - due to the legal risks involved - and later, once the issues were resolved. legal, definitely as an official member. Considering this situation and Mason's few contributions, many critics consider that A Momentary Lapse of Reason should be a solo album by the English guitarist, in the same way that The Final Cut should be a solo album by Waters.
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A year later the band released a double live album accompanied by a video of the concert, called Delicate Sound of Thunder , which was recorded at a series of concerts in Long Island, United States, and later recorded a series of tracks for La Carrera Panamericana , a video of the Mexican competition of the same name. In this race, which had Mason and Gilmour as participants, the latter had an accident together with his co-driver, manager Steve O'Rourke, which broke his leg, although Gilmour only suffered a few scratches.81 These tracks, all of them instrumental, present Wright's first compositions since 1975, and Mason's first since 1973.
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In 1992 the box set Shine On was released, which includes reissues of the records A Saucerful of Secrets, Meddle, The Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here, Animals, The Wall and A Momentary Lapse of Reason along with an album additional called The Early Singles. That same year, Amused to Death, Roger Waters' new solo work, was also released.
Richard Wright's Definitive Return (1993)
Pink Floyd's next studio album was The Division Bell, released in 1994. Made up of all the members of the group and not just by Gilmour exclusively, already with Wright as an official member.
It was better received than A Momentary Lapse of Reason, although purists continued to criticize it for its style. Beyond that, it was the band's second album to top both sides of the Atlantic since Wish You Were Here. The Division Bell is an album whose theme revolves around communication and its conflicts. Many of the lyrics were written by Polly Samson, Gilmour's girlfriend at the time, whom he married shortly after the publication of this work. Along with Samson, the album features most of the musicians who contributed to the band's previous studio work, including Dick Parry, a longtime collaborator from The Dark Side era. In addition, Anthony Moore, who had helped write some of the lyrics for A Momentary Lapse, composed the lyrics for "Wearing the Inside Out," which is also Wright's first vocal contribution since The Dark Side. This same collaboration continued on Wright's later album, Broken China.
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The following year, 1995, the band released a live album titled PULSE that reached number one in the US and contains the songs performed at a London concert on The Division Bell tour, in which it was performed. live the album The Dark Side of the Moon in full. On July 10, 2006 its version was released on DVD, which quickly reached the highest positions in the charts.
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Also in 1995 the band received its first and only Grammy Award in the category of "Best Rock Instrumental Performance" for "Marooned."
LIVE 8
Pink floyd
REUNION
(2005)
On July 2, 2005 , the band reunited with their 4 original members once again for a single performance at the Live 8 concert in London. Waters' return meant they played together again after 24 years. Pink Floyd performed a set of four songs: "Speak to Me / Breathe," "Money," "Wish You Were Here," and "Comfortably Numb," with Gilmour and Waters sharing the vocal duties. At the end of the performance, all the members melted into a joint hug that became one of the most famous images of the concert.
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During the week after Live 8, a sudden interest in the band emerged. According to the HMV online store, sales of Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd increased by 1,343%, while sales of The Wall were up more than 3,600% on Amazon.
David Gilmour later stated that he intended to allocate all these benefits to charities and NGOs, and asked the other artists and companies that took part in Live 8 to do the same. On November 16, 2005 the band was inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame by Pete Townshend, guitarist for The Who. Gilmour and Mason attended the gala, but neither Waters (who appeared via video conference) nor Wright (who was undergoing eye surgery) could be present.
Members' timeline
Studio albums
Sources: Wikipedia & www.pinkfloyd.com
