Pink Floyd Reunion Aftermath

This was posted to the Echoes mailing list that I subscribe to...there are some errors, and when I cut and pasted it from my email, it became sort of jumbled. However, I am for the most part leaving it alone because I don't have the time now to adjust it and I think there will be some interest among the readership. It's an interview with Bob Geldof after Live 8 with some quotes from some others thrown in. As the Echoes member writes, it is not a complete transcription of the article, but most of the important parts are included. Enjoy.

To: "Echoes" <>
I don't think anybody has put this online yet, so here it is. It's not complete (can't possibly transcribe the whole thing) but I made sure all the juicy bits are including, leaving out stuff that has already been printed elsewhere.
Live 8 / Floyd Feature in Word magazine
Transcribed by Thanasis Tsilderikis WITHOUT PERMISSION
WORD MAGAZINE, July 2005 issue

When, midway through their 20-minute set, Waters announced he felt "incredibly emotional to be back with these three guys again", he meant it. As he tried to sing Wish You Were Here, a song about Syd Barrett, his childhood friend and the band's inspirational founder who left in 1968, his voice cracked and he could barely get the words out. Gilmour, Waters's arch-enemy in one of the longest feuds the rock world has witnessed, carried on scowling down at his electric guitar. Although the band played on, none of them had expected such a public declaration from the man who had sued, insulted and mostly just ignored them for 20-odd years. Even Nick Mason, the group's unflappably urbane drummer - and the only member on speaking terms with Waters before the Live 8 reunion - admitted later that "we were all very surprised at the way Roger behaved".

Peter Jenner, the band's first manager, recalled that Waters "was the one who had the courage to drive Syd out, because it was chaos", but that it hurt. "Syd was the only person, I think, who Roger has ever really liked and looked up to, and he always felt very guilty about the fact that he'd blown out his mate." According to Gilmour, Waters proceeded to take it out on him. "I was the new boy. Not only that, I was two years younger than the rest of them, and you know how those playground hierarchies carry over. You never catch up. Roger is not a generous-spirited person. I was constantly dumped on."

Mason believes that it is Waters' absorption in his solo projects which has taken the sting out of rejoining his old adversaries. "Roger's very pragmatic. Because he's enjoyed working on his own, I think that being back with the band feels like a novelty to him."

As relations were warming in one corner of the frosty foursome, they were cooling somewhat in another. Mason's lavishly illustrated, delightfully chatty personal account of Pink Floyd - Inside Out, published in 2004 - did not find favour with David Gilmour.

The book's gossipy, self-deprecating style shortchanged the band's real musical achievements, Gilmour grumbled privately to friends. (Though they live not far from each other in the South of England, in West Sussex and Wiltshire respectively, Gilmour and Mason haven't socialised for years.)

In terms of their recent public profile, the closest thing to a gig Pink Floyd had done prior to Geldof's intervention was a brief performance at the funeral of their manager, Steve O'Rourke, in the summer of 2004. Gilmour, Mason and Wright played WYWH during the service at Chichester cathedral and Wright followed it with a solo piano rendition of Great Gig in the Sky. "It didn't feel like a gig," Mason noted, "and we didn't ask Roger to take part because he still had some differences with Steve, who was very much a part of our team. So he wasn't asked to come at all."

(comment ---> this, I believe, is the first official confirmation that such a 'performance' in O'Rourke's funeral took place, other than the initial rumours that claimed Roger played too, along with Dick Parry.) But here comes the good part. Geldof's own account of the reunion, with his characteristic, wholy un-British, frankness. Enjoy! :-)

Word magazine: Why were you after PF in particular? Bob Geldof: Well, that world audience, those sales. Also, that morning I'd receive a print-out from some guy from an Internet site saying that the Pink Floyd would never play again unless it was something exceptional like Live Aid. So I rang Nick Mason. He said, are you serious? I can't see what would make the others talk to each other. So I called David Gilmour. I've known him since The Wall and he was driving up to London with Polly and he practically swerved off the road. And said mmmm, you know? I said, well, I'll come and see you. I rang him again and he said, look, the answer's no. I want to do my solo album now. Also there's the concern that the record company think there is a giant pot at the end of the PF rainbow. I did a Vicky Pollard - yeah, but, no, but - I said well, don't say no now [ed: Vicky Pollard is a comedy character on British TV, satirical of the 15-year-old working class girls in 'Little Britain' and the way they talk in fits and starts]. Give me a chance to lay out my stall, my purpose, let me come and see you and maybe argue my position. I said I've got to come down and see you, which train do I get? So I get to Croydon and he rings me says Bob, there's no point. I've got as far as Croydon. I'm at East Croydon station, Croydon East, you know! And I said, at least come and pick me up. He was a bit grumpy but he turned up in this lovely od Merc and we went back to his place. And I went into it. He knew I was there to pitch. He was being kind but it was a little awkward and he kept his head and at the end he just said, I just can't go through all that stuff again, and told me I had to try and understand all that.

- - So how did you sell it to him?

Geldof: I laid out the politics of the thing, what would happen if the PF played. The world audience, the uniqueness of the event, the fact that they never said goodbye to the audience, and that every person who ever bought a PF album in the world would have access to them again. He was sotto voce in the end. He took me upstairs and played me some tracks from his new solo album and I told him to take some speed! He said, I get a lot of pleasure out of all this, and they ware very beautiful songs. So he said well, I don't know, I'm not going to change my mind now, Bob. So I didn't crap on about it. I said, at least think about it. He said he was going on holiday for a week and there'd be no time to rehearse. I said do think about it. But then Mason called to say how did you get on? I said, I don't think very well but I'll write him a letter. Next Roger Waters calls me, in a great mood. I think a lot of people think he's bitter and cynical but I don't think he is at all. He's hilarious and has this acerbic wit and he's very up and funny. And he said what's happening? I said will you play? And he said all things considered, I'd love to. That took me back a bit, so I checked with Nick that Rick Wright would be up for it and he said he would. And I rang Roger back and Roger said 'What's Old Grumpy up to? I said, still being fairly grumpy."

:-D :-D :-D

Geldof: "There were clearly lots of unarticulated things going on, lots of water still flowing under those bridges. And Roger said I'd like to do it and I'd like to do it in London if we can do it. I said, dude, you can do it on the moon, you know! Now Nick, Rick and Roger appeared to be absolutely wanting to do it but Dave was away. I said I'd written Dave a letter, I called Nick again and told him about Dave and he said "It's the curse of leadership."

- - Referring to Roger or Dave Gilmour?

Geldof: "Referring to Dave, I suppose, as Dave's the one who has led the Floyd for the last 20 years. The burden of carrying on gradually. And Dave is with his new family and he's just got rid of that house and Dave I think just didn't want to go back to that place he'd been before. Roger on the other hand had become hugely expansive and was wanting to gig and quite prepared to let sleeping dogs lie. Terrible cliche but it's true. It was sort of like a reversal of roles really. And Roger said, have you got Gilmour's number? I heard no more for two weeks and then the phone goes and a voice says, all right then. I said sorry? He said "It's Gilmour. All right then." "I said you're not fucking serious! Fuckin' hell, you've made an old man very happy. Not that I can stand you cunts but you've made an old retro-punk very happy! Cos I never liked their music, really."

comment ---> Sir Bob doesn't mince his words, does he? You gotta give him that!

Geldof: "I rang Roger and told him Dave had called and he said "Oh Good. Where will we be on the bill?" Apparently that first meeting they had together was great. What older people should behave like, all grins and smiles. Nick told me, you know without being mawkish or anything, that it was like being in a band again. So familiar and fun and so good. Instantly they got to sorting out what songs they would play and even asked me at one point if I thought they were all right. 'What do you think?' I said, what do you mean what do I think?! The enormity of the Floyd playing again. The sheer numbers of eyeballs watching, all marshalled to a political end, it's amazing. In the US this is a bigger story than Live 8, why this band with such a painful history of disorder, why are they doing it?


- - Was this the biggest news story you could have engineered? I can't think of a bigger one.


Geldof: "In pop terms, absolutely. The whole point was the brand, and the individuals have become more and more fascinating as a result. As you began to understand the dynamics of each song and who did which bit it became fascinating. And their strange sense of politics, politics on a polite English level but with a profound bitterness. I didn't care for the music much but I genuinely like them as people.

- - Do you think all bands will reunite eventually, and that events like Live 8 just give them the excuse to do so?

Geldof: "No, I don't really. I think age is the excuse. You look at it and think back to what it was. We were glorious, you know! I don't know why we were glorious but let's acknowledge it! I'd like to play to all those people again! Whatever happened to us was just clearly uniquely good. It's not to recapture the old glory." Later in the article, there's that Mason quote reprinted again: Mason: "Bob and Roger are a bit like Hitler and Stalin with a better sense of humour. And, in Bob's case, worse hair."

There's an interesting account (Nick's) of the whole dynamics of Gilmour's upcoming solo album and PF reuniting for Live 8: Mason: "The moral pressure on anyone to do something like this is phenomenal." He totally sympathised with Gilmour's predicament:

"Live 8's going to impinge on next year when he tours as a solo artist. People will be saying, "Come on Dave, do some Floyd material", as they will have just seen him do some. And it takes a hell of a long time to establish yourself as a solo artist. But Bob rang me and said 'David Gilmour won't do it'. And I felt, well, that's Dave. You can take a horse to water but you can't make him drink. In Dave's case you can't even get him near the water. So Roger rang David and that cemented it. Bob then spoke to Roger and he agreed. I think he felt -well we all felt actually - that it was a shame we didn't play Live Aid but we didn't really exist as a band at the time."


Very interesting stuff.