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Goodbye Cruel World (song)

Goodbye Cruel World (song)

Goodbye Cruel World is a song by the British progressive rock band Pink Floyd. It was released on The Wall album in 1979.

Composition

The song is quiet in dynamic, and is somewhat rhythmic in nature, with a soft repeating guitar pulse throughout. Notably, the final instance of the word "goodbye" is spoken as the music is cut, causing the final "goodbye" to appear somewhat despairing.

Plot

As with the other songs on The Wall, Goodbye Cruel World tells a portion of the story of Pink, the album's protagonist. This song details Pink's reaction to the completion of his mental wall, and marks his acknowledgement of his isolation from society. Category:Pink Floyd songs

United Kingdom

:For other meanings of the terms "United Kingdom" and "UK" , see United Kingdom (disambiguation) and UK (disambiguation). :For an explanation of terms like England, (Great) Britain and United Kingdom see British Isles (terminology). The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (usually shortened to the United Kingdom or the UK) is a country located off the north-western coast of continental Europe, surrounded by the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea, the Irish Sea, and the Atlantic Ocean. It is composed of four constituent parts: three constituent countries—England, Scotland, and Wales—on the island of Great Britain, and the province of Northern Ireland on the island of Ireland. The border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland forms the United Kingdom's principal international land border, although there is a nominal frontier with France in the middle of the Channel Tunnel. The UK has several overseas territories and the Crown dependencies of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands come under the UK's sovereignty. The UK also has close relationships with the fifteen other Commonwealth Realms, as they all share the same head of state. The UK is also one of the largest member states of the European Union and a founding partner of both the UN and NATO.
Terminology

- United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: The official name for the sovereign state
- United Kingdom: an abbreviation of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Britain: an informal term that sometimes means United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and sometimes means Great Britain
- British: an informal term that sometimes means from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and sometimes means from Great Britain
- Great Britain (as a geographical term): the largest island of the British Isles
- Great Britain (as a political term): England + Wales + Scotland
- British Isles (as a geographical term): Great Britain + Ireland + many smaller surrounding islands. This term is disputed, please see below.
- Ireland (as a geographical term): the second largest island of the British Isles
- Ireland (as a political term): an abbreviation of the Republic of Ireland, a sovereign state on the island of Ireland
- Northern Ireland: a political region of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Ulster (as a geographical term): Often used to refer to Northern Ireland. It is derived from the Irish Language term 'Ulad.' It was one of the ancient Irish provinces (the others were Connaught, Leinster and Munster.). Although it is normally used to refer to Northern Ireland, Ulster also (traditionally) includes Counties Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal, which lie in the Republic of Ireland. The term Ulster is often favoured by the Protestant community.
History
Protestant Today's state is the latest of several unions formed over the last 1000 years. Scotland and England have existed as separate unified entities since the 10th century. Wales, under English control since the Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284, became part of the Kingdom of England by the Laws in Wales Act 1535. With the Act of Union 1707, the separate kingdoms of England and Scotland, having shared the same monarch since 1603, agreed to a permanent union as the Kingdom of Great Britain. The Act of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain with the Kingdom of Ireland, which had been gradually brought under English control between 1169 and 1691, to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was formed in 1922, after bitter fighting which echoes down to the current political strife, the Anglo-Irish Treaty partitioned Ireland into the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland, with the latter remaining part of the United Kingdom. As provided for in the treaty, Northern Ireland, which consists of six of the nine counties of the Irish province of Ulster, immediately opted out of the Free State and to remain in the UK. The nomenclature of the UK was changed in 1927 to recognise the departure of most of Ireland, with the current name being adopted. 1927 The United Kingdom, the dominant industrial and maritime power of the 19th century, played a leading role in developing Western world ideas of property, liberty, capitalism and parliamentary democracy - to say nothing of its part in advancing world literature and science. At its zenith, the British Empire stretched over one quarter of the Earth's surface and encompassed a third of its population. The first half of the 20th century saw the UK's strength seriously depleted from the effects of World War I and World War II. The second half witnessed the dismantling of the Empire and the UK rebuilding itself into a modern and prosperous nation. The UK has been a member of the European Union since 1973. Its attitude towards further integration is conservative, and there is significant Euroscepticism in UK politics. It has not chosen to adopt the Euro, owing to internal political considerations and the government's judgement of the prevailing economic conditions.
Government and politics
The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy, with executive power exercised on behalf of the Queen by the Prime Minister and other cabinet ministers who head departments. The cabinet, including the Prime Minister, and other ministers collectively make up Her Majesty's Government. These ministers are drawn from and are responsible to Parliament, the legislative body, which is traditionally considered to be "supreme" (that is, able to legislate on any matter and not bound by decisions of its predecessors). The UK is one of the few countries in the world today that does not have a codified constitution, relying instead on customs and separate pieces of constitutional law. While the monarch is Head of State and holds all executive power, it is the Prime Minister who is the head of government. The government is answerable chiefly to the House of Commons and the Prime Minister is drawn from this chamber of Parliament by constitutional convention. The majority of cabinet members will be from the House of Commons, the rest from the House of Lords. Ministers do not, however, legally have to come from Parliament, though that is the modern day custom. The British system of government has been emulated around the world - a legacy of the United Kingdom's colonial past - most notably in the other Commonwealth Realms. The Prime Minister is chosen as the MP who can command a majority in the House of Commons - usually the leader of the largest party or, if there is no majority party, the largest coalition. The current Prime Minister is Tony Blair of the Labour Party, who has been in office since 1997. In the United Kingdom the monarch has extensive theoretical powers, but his or her role is mainly, though not exclusively, ceremonial. The monarch is an integral part of Parliament (as the "Crown-in-Parliament") and theoretically gives Parliament the power to meet and create legislation. An Act of Parliament does not become law until it has been signed by the Queen (being given Royal Assent), although no monarch has refused to assent to a bill that has been approved by Parliament since Queen Anne in 1708. Although the abolition of the monarchy has been suggested several times, the popularity of the monarchy remains strong in spite of recent controversies. Support for a British republic usually fluctuates between 15% and 25% of the population, with roughly 10% undecided or indifferent [http://www.mori.com/mrr/2000/c000616.shtml]. The current monarch is Queen Elizabeth II who acceded to the throne in 1952 and was crowned in 1953. Parliament is the national legislature of the United Kingdom. It is the ultimate legislative authority in the United Kingdom, according to the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty. It is bicameral, composed of the elected House of Commons and the unelected House of Lords, whose members are mostly appointed. The House of Commons is the more powerful of the two houses. The House of Commons has 646 members who are directly elected from single-member constituencies based on population. The House of Lords has 724 members (though this number is not fixed): hereditary peers, life peers, and bishops of the Church of England. The Church of England is the established church of the state in England. established church]] The two largest political parties are the Labour Party and Conservative Party. The UK has long had a two-party system, but in the last 20 years the Liberal Democrats have re-emerged as a large third party. The electoral system used for general elections is first-past-the-post. The constitution of the United Kingdom is un-codified and partially unwritten, which means that no single document regulates how the government works, and unwritten constitutional conventions are used extensively. The constitution is based on the principle that Parliament is the ultimate sovereign body in the country. There has long been a widespread sense of national identity in the Celtic nations. Throughout the late 19th century the UK debated giving Ireland home rule. The Scottish National Party was founded in 1934, and Plaid Cymru (Party of Wales) in 1925. Referenda for devolution succeeded in 1997 for Scotland and Wales and in 1998 for Northern Ireland. In 1999, the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales were established, the former having primary legislative power. Proportional representation is used for the elections, which has resulted in a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition government in Scotland. Due to internal disagreements, the Northern Ireland Assembly has been suspended since 2002.
Subdivisions
The United Kingdom is a country that is divided into four constituent parts:
- England
- Scotland
- Northern Ireland
- Wales The constituent parts of the United Kingdom have administrative subdivisions as follows:
- The regions and administrative counties of England
- The council areas of Scotland
- The counties and county boroughs of Wales
- The districts of Northern Ireland The Laws in Wales Act 1535 incorporated Wales and England into England and Wales for legal purposes. Although all four have historically been divided into counties, England's population is an order of magnitude larger than the others so in recent years it has for some purposes been divided into nine intermediate-level Government Office Regions. Each region is made up of counties and unitary authorities, apart from London, which consists of London boroughs. Although at one point it was intended that each or some of these regions would be given its own regional assembly, the plan's future is uncertain, as of 2004, after the North East region rejected its proposed assembly in a referendum. Scotland consists of 32 Council Areas. Wales consists of 22 Unitary Authorities, styled as 10 County Boroughs, 9 Counties, and 3 Cities. Northern Ireland is divided into 26 Districts. Also sometimes associated with the United Kingdom, though not constitutionally part of the United Kingdom itself, are the Crown dependencies (the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey, and the Isle of Man) as self-governing possessions of the Crown, and a number of overseas territories under the sovereignty of the United Kingdom.
Military
The armed forces of the United Kingdom are known as the British Armed Forces or Her Majesty's Armed Forces, officially the Armed Forces of the Crown. Their Commander-in-Chief is the Queen and they are managed by the Ministry of Defence. Ministry of Defence The British Armed Forces are charged with protecting the United Kingdom and its overseas territories, promoting the United Kingdom's wider security interests, and supporting international peacekeeping efforts. They are active and regular participants in NATO and other coalition operations. The United Kingdom fields one of the most powerful and comprehensive military forces in the World. Its global power projection capabilities are second only to those of the United States Armed Forces. The British Army had a reported strength of 112,700 in 2004, including 7,600 women, and the Royal Air Force a strength of 53,400. The 40,900-member Royal Navy is in charge of the United Kingdom's independent strategic nuclear arm, which consists of four Trident Ballistic Missile Submarines, while the Royal Marines provide infantry units for amphibious assault and for specialist reinforcement forces in and beyond the NATO area. This puts total active duty military troops in the 210,000 range, currently deployed in over 80 countries. The UK's special forces, principally the SAS, provides elite commandos trained for quick, mobile, military responses; often where secrecy or covert operations are required. The Royal Navy is the second largest navy in the World in terms of gross tonnage. Despite the United Kingdom's wide ranging capabilities, recent pragmatic defence policy has a stated assumption that any large operation would be undertaken as part of a coalition. Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq (Granby, No-Fly-Zones, Desert Fox and Telic) may all be taken as precedent - indeed the last true war in which the British military fought alone was the Falklands War of 1982, in which military action was initiated by Argentina and the UK was fighting a defensive, rather than offensive, campaign. The British army has been actively involved in the Troubles in Northern Ireland. However, a programme of demilitarisation is being gradually implemented.
Geography
Troubles World Factbook Map of the United Kingdom]] Most of England consists of rolling lowland terrain, divided east from west by more mountainous terrain in the Northwest (Cumbrian Mountains of the Lake District) and north (the upland moors of the Pennines) and limestone hills of the Peak District by the Tees-Exe line. The lower limestone hills of the Isle of Purbeck, Cotswolds, Lincolnshire and chalk downs of the Southern England Chalk Formation. The main rivers and estuaries are the Thames, Severn and the Humber Estuary. The largest urban area is Greater London. Near Dover, the Channel Tunnel links the United Kingdom with France. There is no peak in England that is 1000 metres (3,300 ft) or greater. Wales is mostly mountainous, the highest peak being Snowdon at 1085 metres (3,560 ft) above sea level. North of the mainland is the island of Anglesey. The largest and capital city is Cardiff, located in South Wales. Scotland's geography is varied, with lowlands in the south and east and highlands in the north and west, including Ben Nevis, the UK's highest mountain at 1343 metres (4,406 ft). There are many long and deep-sea arms, firths, and lochs. A multitude of islands west and north of Scotland are also included, notably the Hebrides, Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands. The largest city is Glasgow. Northern Ireland, making up the north-eastern part of Ireland, is mostly hilly. The main cities are Belfast ('Beal Feirste' in Irish) and Londonderry / Derry ('Doire' in Irish). The province is home to one of the UK’s World Heritage Sites, the Giant's Causeway, which consists of more than 40,000 six-sided basalt columns up to 40 feett (12 m) high. In total it is estimated that the UK includes around 1098 small islands, some being natural and some being crannogs, a type of artificial island which was built in past times using stone and wood, gradually enlarged by natural waste building up over time.
Economy
artificial island The United Kingdom, a leading trading power and financial centre, has an essentially capitalist economy, the fourth largest in the world in terms of market exchange rates and the sixth largest by purchasing power parity (PPP) exchange rates. Over the past three decades, the government has greatly reduced public ownership by means of privatisation programmes, and has contained the growth of the Welfare State. Agriculture is intensive, highly mechanised, and efficient by European standards, producing about 60% of food needs with only 1% of the labour force. The UK has large coal, natural gas, and oil reserves; primary energy production accounts for 10% of GDP, one of the highest shares of any industrial state. Services, particularly banking, insurance and business services, account for by far the largest proportion of GDP. Industry continues to decline in importance, although the UK is still Europe's largest manufacturer of armaments, petroleum products, personal computers, televisions, and mobile telephones. Tourism is also important: with over 24 million tourists a year, between China (33) and Austria (19.1), the United Kingdom is ranked as the sixth major tourist destination in the world. The Blair government has put off the question of participation in the Euro system, citing five economic tests that would need to be met before they recommend that the UK adopts the Euro, and hold a referendum.
Society

Demographics
At the April 2001 census, the United Kingdom's population was 58,789,194, the third-largest in the European Union (behind Germany and metropolitan France) and the twenty-first largest in the world. Its overall population density is one of the highest in the world. Almost one-third of the population lives in England's prosperous south-east and is predominantly urban and suburban--with about 7.2 million in the capital of London. The United Kingdom's high literacy rate (99%) is attributable to universal public education introduced for the primary level in 1870 and secondary level in 1900 (except in Scotland where it was introduced in 1696). Education is mandatory from ages five through sixteen. referendum The Church of England and the Church of Scotland function as the official national religions in their respective countries, but most religions found in the world are represented in the United Kingdom. Anglicanism is the state religion that has been established in England since 1534 during the reign of King Henry VIII. During his reign, England broke ties with the Roman Catholic church and established the Church of England as the offical religion of England. Reforms to the nature of the church's relationship to the state have been ongoing, especially concerning the nature of the House of Lords and the appointment of a fixed amount of the lordships going to Lords Temporal, bishops of the Church of England. A group of islands close to continental Europe, the British Isles have been subject to many invasions and migrations, especially from Scandinavia and the continent, including Roman occupation for several centuries. Contemporary Britons are descended mainly from the varied ethnic stocks that settled there before the eleventh century. The pre-Celtic, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse influences were blended on Great Britain under the Normans, Scandinavian Vikings who had lived in Northern France. Although Celtic languages persist in Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, the predominant language is English, which is a West Germanic language descended from Old English, featuring a large amount of borrowings from Norman French.The other indigenous languages include the Celtic languages; Welsh, the closely related Irish and Scots Gaelic, and the Cornish language; as well as Lowland Scots, which is closely related to English; Romany; and British Sign Language (Northern Ireland Sign Language is also used in Northern Ireland). Celtic dialectal influences from Cumbric persisted in Northern England for many centuries, most famously in a unique set of numbers used for counting sheep. Recent immigrants, especially from the Commonwealth, speak many other languages, including Bengali, Cantonese, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu. The United Kingdom has the largest number of Hindi speaking peoples outside of the Indian sub continent.
Culture
Urdu The United Kingdom contains many of the world's leading universities, including the University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford and the University of London (which incorporates, amongst others, Imperial College and University College London), and has produced many great scientists and engineers including Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Isambard Kingdom Brunel; the nation is credited with many inventions including the locomotive, vaccination, television, vacuum, and both the internal combustion and the jet engine. The English language has spread to all corners of the world (primarily because of the country’s empire) and is referred to as a ‘global language’. It is now taught as a second language more than any other around the world. Over the next few decades, it is estimated that approximately half the world’s population will be proficient in the language. Playwright William Shakespeare is arguably the most famous writer in the history of the English language; other well-known writers from the United Kingdom include the Brontë sisters (Charlotte, Emily, and Anne), Jane Austen, William Thackeray, J. R. R. Tolkien, John Milton, H. G. Wells and Charles Dickens. Important poets include Lord Byron, Robert Burns, Lord Tennyson and William Blake. Notable composers from the United Kingdom have included William Byrd, John Taverner, William Lawes, John Dowland, Thomas Tallis, and Henry Purcell from the 16th and early 17th centuries, and, more recently, Sir Edward Elgar, Sir Arthur Sullivan (most famous for working with librettist Sir W. S. Gilbert), Ralph Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten in the 19th and 20th. George Frideric Handel spent most of his composing life in England. The BBC is the oldest and perhaps the most respected broadcasting network on the globe, with the BBC World Service radio channel and its news output held in particularly high regard. The other main television networks are ITV, Channel 4, five (TV) and Sky Television. Popular programmes in the UK include the three soaps Eastenders, Coronation Street and Emmerdale, as well as the comedy news quiz Have I Got News For You and Reality TV shows Big Brother and The X Factor. Various British TV formats have been exported to other nations, notably Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, The Weakest Link and The Office. The UK was, with the US, one of the two main contributors in the development of rock and roll, and the UK has provided some of the most famous rock stars, including the Beatles, Queen, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Rolling Stones, The Who and many others. The UK was at the forefront of punk rock music in the 1970s with bands such as the Sex Pistols and The Clash, and the subsequent rebirth of heavy metal with bands such as Motörhead and Iron Maiden. In mid to late '90s, the Britpop phenomenon has seen bands such as Oasis, Blur, Radiohead and Coldplay gain international fame. The UK is also at the forefront of electronica, with British artists such as Aphex Twin, Talvin Singh, Nitin Sawhney and Lamb at the cutting edge. The United Kingdom was also associated with music from the Caribbean, with a large number of Jamaicans and other Caribbean nationals being present in the UK.
Sport
A great number of major sports originated in the United Kingdom, including football, golf, cricket, rugby, tennis and boxing. The national sport of the UK is association football, but the UK does not compete as a nation in any major football tournament. Instead, the home nations compete individually as England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is because of this unique four-team arrangement that the UK currently does not compete in football events at the Olympic Games. However, a united team will probably take part in the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, as these are hosted in London. The English and Northern Irish football associations have confirmed participation in this team while the Scottish FA and the Welsh FA have declined to participate. The UK also hosts many world-renowned football clubs, such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal in England and Rangers and Celtic in Scotland. Clubs compete in national leagues and competitions and some go on to compete in European competitions. Both forms of rugby are national sports. Rugby League originates from and is generally played in the North of England, whilst Rugby Union is played all over Britain. In Rugby League the UK plays as one nation - Great Britain - whilst in union it is represented by the four nations. England are the current holders of the Rugby Union World Cup. Every four years the British and Irish Lions (comprising the best players from England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland) tour other countries. Cricket is also played in the UK, although it is focussed in England. The Wimbledon Championships are an international tennis event held in Wimbledon in south London every summer and are seen as the most prestigious of the tennis calendar. Golf is one of the most popular participation sports played in the UK and St Andrews in Scotland is the sport's home course.
Miscellaneous topics

External links

- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/state/nations/ BBC Nations] History of the nations within the UK.
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)]
- [http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/uk.html CIA World Factbook: UK.]
- [http://www.direct.gov.uk Gateway to UK governmental services and websites.]
- [http://www.number-10.gov.uk Number 10 Downing Street]
- [http://www.statistics.gov.uk Office of National Statistics]
- [http://www.opsi.gov.uk Office of Public Sector Information] Source for all UK legislation 1987-present (successor to Her Majesty's Stationery Office).
- [http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/britishisles/ The British Isles] Independent view of the UK.
- [http://www.royal.gov.uk The British Monarchy]
- [http://www.parliament.uk/ The United Kingdom Parliament]
- [http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=5703&Pos=&ColRank=1&Rank=272 Official Yearbook of the UK] factbook produced by the Office for National Statistics (years 2000 to 2005 available online).
- [http://www.ukcities.co.uk UK Cities] lists a variety of useful resources for every city in the UK.
- [http://www.justuk.org UK travel guide] United Kingdom for travellers.
- [http://www.world66.com/europe/unitedkingdom World66 Guide to United Kingdom] A travel guide written by its users.
- [http://www.multimap.co.uk www.multimap.co.uk] provides online maps and aerial photographs of the UK.
- [http://www.streetmap.co.uk www.streetmap.co.uk] an alternative to multimap.
- [http://www.freeworldmaps.net/europe/united-kingdom/map.html Physical map of United Kingdom.]
- [http://www.upmystreet.com www.upmystreet.com] detailed localised information about places in the United Kingdom.
- [http://www.parks.it/world/UK/Eindex.html UK Parks] National parks, Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and other protected areas. ----
Category:British Isles Category:European countries Category:European Union member states Category:Members of the Commonwealth of Nations Category:Monarchies A als:Grossbritannien und Nordirland zh-min-nan:Liân-ha̍p Ông-kok ko:영국 ms:United Kingdom ja:イギリス simple:United Kingdom th:สหราชอาณาจักร

Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd (formed in 1965 in Cambridge, England) is a British progressive rock band, noted for their progressive compositions, thoughtful lyrics, sonic experimentation, album art and live shows. Pink Floyd is one of rock's most successful acts, having sold 73.5 million albums in the U.S. alone. The group is also believed to have sold an estimated 175 to 200 million albums worldwide.

Overview

Pink Floyd enjoyed moderate success in the late-1960s as a psychedelic band led by Syd Barrett. After Barrett's erratic behavior caused his colleagues to add guitarist David Gilmour (who eventually replaced Barrett), the band went on to record several elaborate concept albums, achieving worldwide success with 1973's Dark Side of the Moon and 1979's The Wall both among the best-selling and most enduringly popular albums in rock history.

Live Performances

Pink Floyd is renowned for their lavish stage shows, combining over-the-top visual experiences with their music to create a show in which the performers themselves are almost secondary. In their early days, Pink Floyd were among the first bands to use a dedicated traveling light show in conjunction with their performances, projecting slides, film clips, pyrotechnics (exploding flashpots and the exploding gong and fireworks) and psychedelic patterns onto a large circular screen (dubbed "Mr. Screen"). Their early combination of music and visuals set the standard for subsequent rock tours on both sides of the Atlantic. Later shows featured oversized balloons (notably a giant pig balloon which floated over the audience during performances of Pigs from the Animals album), a plane crashing into the stage at the end of "On the Run", a giant flowering disco ball (a projection screen which could be retracted and tilted), more than 100 multi-colored robotic 'dancing' spot lights, and multi-colored lasers. Their constant push for technological innovation in their concert shows is famously demonstrated by their use of extremely powerful, isotope splitting copper-vapor (rather than the usual argon) lasers in the 1994 Division Bell tour. These gold-colored lasers were worth over $120,000 apiece and previously used only in nuclear research and high speed photography ([http://www.lightingdimensions.com Lighting Dimensions], September 1994). The lavish stage shows were also the basis for Douglas Adams' fictional rock group "Disaster Area" (creators of the loudest noise in the universe, and making use of solar flares in their stage show) in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Douglas Adams was a personal friend of David Gilmour and made a one-off guest appearance, on guitar, on the Division Bell tour (October 28, 1994), purportedly as a present for Adams' 42nd birthday.

Split and reunion

In 1985, bassist Roger Waters declared Pink Floyd defunct, but the remaining band members recorded and twice toured under the Pink Floyd name without him. Waters rejoined the band at the London Live 8 concert on July 2, 2005, playing to Pink Floyd's biggest audience ever.

Band history

Syd Barrett led years: 1965-1968

2005 Pink Floyd evolved from an earlier band, formed in 1964, which was at various times called Sigma 6, The Meggadeaths, The Screaming Abdabs, and The Abdabs (see Band members for previous line-ups). When this band split up, some of its members - guitarist Bob Klose, bass player Roger Waters, drummer Nick Mason, and future keyboardist Rick Wright, who at this point played primarily wind instruments - formed a new band called Tea Set. A short time after their formation, they were joined by guitarist Syd Barrett, who became the band's primary vocalist as well. When Tea Set found itself on the same bill as another band with the same name, Barrett came up with an alternate name on the spur of the moment, choosing The Pink Floyd Sound (after two blues musicians, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council). For a time after this they oscillated between 'Tea Set' and 'The Pink Floyd Sound', with the latter name eventually winning out. The word Sound was dropped fairly quickly, but the definite article was still used occasionally for several years afterward, up to about the time of the More soundtrack. In the early days, the band covered rhythm and blues staples such as "Louie, Louie", but gained notoriety for their psychedelic interpretations, with extended improvised sections and 'spaced out' solos. The heavily jazz-oriented Klose left the band to become a photographer shortly before Pink Floyd started recording, leaving an otherwise stable lineup. Barrett started writing his own songs, influenced by American surf music and British psychedelic rock with his own brand of whimsical humor. Pink Floyd became a favorite in the underground movement, playing at such prominent venues as the UFO club, the Marquee Club and the Roundhouse. As their popularity increased, the band formed Blackhill Enterprises in October 1966, a six-way business partnership with their managers, Peter Jenner and Andrew King issuing the singles "Arnold Layne" in March 1967 and "See Emily Play" in June 1967. "Arnold Layne" reached number 20 in the UK singles chart, and "See Emily Play" reached number 6, granting the band their first TV appearance on Top of the Pops in July 1967. Released in August 1967, the band's debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (originally called "Projection") is considered to be a prime example of English psychedelic music. The album's tracks, predominantly written by Barrett, showcase poetic lyrics and an eclectic mixture of music, from the avant garde free form piece "Interstellar Overdrive" to whimsical songs, such as "The Scarecrow", inspired by the Fenlands, the rural region north of Cambridge, Barrett, Gilmour and Waters's home town. The album was a hit in the UK where it peaked at #6, but failed to get much attention in North America, reaching #131 in the US. During this period, the band toured with Jimi Hendrix, gaining them further popularity.

Barrett's decline

As the band became more and more popular, the stresses of life on the road and a significant intake of psychedelic drugs took its toll on Barrett. In January 1968, guitarist David Gilmour joined the band to carry out the playing and singing duties of Syd, whose mental health had been deteriorating for several months. Nevertheless, it was intended that Barrett would remain as the band's figurehead and main songwriter. With Barrett's behavior becoming less and less predictable, and his use of LSD almost constant, he became very unstable, often staring into space while the rest of the band performed. The band's live shows became increasingly ramshackle until, eventually, the other band members simply stopped taking him to the concerts. Once Barrett's departure was formalized in April 1968, producers Jenner and King decided to remain with him, and the six-way Blackhill partnership was dissolved. The band adopted Steve O'Rourke as their manager, and he remained with Pink Floyd until his death in 2003.

Finding their feet: 1969-1970

Steve O'Rourke

A Saucerful of Secrets

Whilst Barrett had written the bulk of the first record, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, only one Barrett composition, the Piper outtake "Jugband Blues", appeared on the second Floyd album. A Saucerful of Secrets was released in June 1968, reaching #9 in the UK and becoming the only Pink Floyd album not to chart in the U.S. The album contained hints of things to come, the center-piece being the 12-minute title track. Future Floyd albums would expand upon the lengthy compositions, offering more focused songwriting with each subsequent release.

Pink Floyd were recruited by director Barbet Schroeder to produce a soundtrack for his film, "More", which premiered in May 1969. The music was released as a Floyd album in its own right, Music From the Film More, in July 1969 . Pink Floyd would use this and future soundtrack recording sessions to produce work that may not have fit into their idea of what would appear on a proper Pink Floyd LP, many of the numbers on Music From The Film More being acoustic folk songs. The rest of the album consisted of incidental music with a few rockers such as "The Nile Song" thrown in.

Ummagumma

The next record, the double album Ummagumma, was a mix of live recordings and unchecked studio experimentation by the band members, with each recording half a side of a vinyl as a solo project (Mason's wife makes an uncredited contribution as a flautist). The album was Pink Floyd's most popular release yet, hitting UK #5 and making the U.S. charts at #70.

Atom Heart Mother

flautist 1970's Atom Heart Mother, their first recording with an orchestra, was a collaboration with avant-garde composer Ron Geesin. One side of the album consisted of the title piece, a 23-minute long rock-orchestral suite. The second side featured one song from each of the band's then-current vocalists (Roger Waters' "If", David Gilmour's "Fat Old Sun" and Rick Wright's "Summer 68"). Another lengthy piece, "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast", was a sound collage of a man cooking and eating breakfast and his thoughts on the matter, linked with instrumentals. The album had the best chart performance for the band so far, reaching #1 in the U.K. and #55 in the U.S., although the album has since been described by Gilmour as the sound of a band "blundering about in the dark." The album was a transitional piece for the group, hinting at future musical territory. The popularity of the album allowed Pink Floyd to embark on their first U.S. tour. The band also developed and pioneered the use of a device called the azimuth co-ordinator, a joystick used to pan sound around their quadrophonic PA system.

Breakthrough era: 1971-1975

quadrophonic

Meddle

The band's sound was considerably more focused on Meddle (1971), with the 23-minute epic "Echoes" taking up the entire second side of the LP. Meddle was considered by David Gilmour to be his first "real" Pink Floyd album, as it had the sound and style of the succeeding breakthrough-era Pink Floyd albums and stripped away the orchestra that was prominent in Atom Heart Mother. Meddle also included the atmospheric "One of These Days", a concert classic, with Nick Mason's menacing one-line vocal, "One of these days, I'm going to cut you into little pieces," and a melody that at one point segues into a throbbing synthetic pulse quoting the theme tune of the cult classic science fiction television show Doctor Who. A glimpse into their humorous side was shown on "Seamus" (earlier, "Mademoiselle Nobs"), a pseudo-blues number featuring lead vocals by a Russian wolfhound called Seamus, belonging to Steve Marriott. Waters' jazzy "San Tropez" was brought to the band practically completed, requiring minimal help in arrangement from the other band members. Pink Floyd was rewarded with a #3 chart peak in the UK for Meddle; it made #70 in U.S.

Obscured By Clouds

Obscured By Clouds was released in 1972 as the soundtrack to the film La Vallee, another art house film by Barbet Schroeder. This was the band's first U.S. Top 50 album (where it hit #46), hitting #6 at in the U.K. Barbet Schroeder

Dark Side of the Moon

Despite Pink Floyd never having been a hit-single-driven group (at the time they had stopped issuing singles after 1968's "Point Me At The Sky"), their massively successful 1973 album, Dark Side of the Moon, featured a U.S. Top 20 single ("Money"). Although the album hit #2 in U.K., it managed to become the band's first #1 on U.S. charts, a huge improvement over the last albums. The critically-acclaimed album stayed on the Billboard Top 200 for an unprecedent 741 weeks (including 591 consecutive weeks from 1973 to 1988), the world record, and making it one of the top-selling albums of all time. It also remained 301 weeks on U.K. charts, despite never hitting #1 there. Dark Side of the Moon went on to sell over 40 million copies worldwide and still sells around 250,000 copies a year, more than any other album of the 70s. On its new release in 2003 it was reported that it was selling 8,000 copies per week. Dark Side of the Moon, the first of Pink Floyd's five concept albums, described the different pressures applying in everyday life. The concept (conceived in Nick Mason's kitchen) proved a powerful catalyst for the band and together they drew up a list of themes: "On The Run" was dedicated to travel; "Time" depicted the encroachment of old age; "The Great Gig In The Sky" (originally named "Mortality Sequence" and "Religious Theme" during development) dealt with death; "Money" satirically spoke of the corrupting influence of money that often comes with fame and power; "Us And Them" entailed violence, and futility of war (a theme to which Waters would return, throughout his career) and "Brain Damage" touched on themes of insanity and neurosis. Thanks to the use of new 16-track recording equipment at Abbey Road Studios and the investment of an enormous amount of time by engineer Alan Parsons, the album set new standards for sound fidelity. It was during this period that the band released the first of their films, "Live at Pompeii". Film Director Adrian Maben's film featured footage of the band's 1971 performance at an amphitheater in Pompeii with no audience present (only the film crew and stage staff). A later version of Live at Pompeii labelled "director's cut" was released on DVD which had each song interspersed with interviews and behind-the-scenes footage of the band in the studio recording Dark Side Of The Moon. Dark Side of the Moon and the three following albums (Wish You Were Here, Animals and The Wall) are widely regarded as the peak of Pink Floyd's career.

Wish You Were Here

Wish You Were Here, released in 1975, carries an abstract theme of absence: absence of any humanity within the music industry and, most poignantly, the absence of Syd Barrett. This theme is carried by the music as well as the artwork packaged with the album. Originally, the album was sold with a black cellophane wrapping, hiding any indication of what could be beneath. In addition to the classic acoustic title track, Wish You Were Here, the album includes the majestic, mostly instrumental nine-part Shine On You Crazy Diamond, a tribute to Barrett in which the lyrics deal explicitly with the aftermath of his breakdown. The album also includes the songs "Welcome to the Machine" and "Have a Cigar" (Roy Harper sang the latter), both of which harshly criticize the music industry. Pink Floyd achieved their first transatlantic #1 album with Wish You Were Here, reaching the top spot in both U.K. and U.S. The album eventually sold over 10 million copies worldwide.

Knebworth '75

Dark Side of the Moon had made Pink Floyd a major international act. In 1975, the band launched a massive tour after the release of Wish You Were Here, which eventually sold out stadiums. The last gig of the tour was as the headliner of 1975 Knebworth Festival, which also featured The Steve Miller Band, Captain Beefheart and Roy Harper (who joined Pink Floyd on the stage to sing 'Have a Cigar'). It was the second Knebworth Festival, which featured artists such as the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Genesis and Frank Zappa between 1974 and 1979. The concert featured a large circular screen, lighting towers and great special effects for the time. Despite some technical problems, the band managed to perform a remarkable concert, before an audience of 125,000, their biggest until Live 8. It was the last time the band performed 'Echoes' and the entire Dark Side of the Moon with Roger Waters.

Roger Waters-led era: 1976-1984

Animals

By January 1977, and the release of Animals (UK #2, U.S. #3), the band's music came under increasing criticism from some quarters in the new punk rock sphere as being too flabby and pretentious, having lost its way from the simplicity of early rock and roll. However, Animals was considerably more guitar-driven than the previous albums, due to either the influence of the punk-rock movement or the fact that the album was recorded at Pink Floyd's new (and somewhat incomplete) Britannia Row Studios. Animals again contained lengthy songs tied to a theme, this time taken in part from George Orwell's Animal Farm, using pigs, dogs and sheep as metaphors for members of contemporary society. Animals was the first Pink Floyd album not to feature any compositions from Rick Wright. Four of the five songs on this record were written entirely by Roger Waters, with one song, 'Dogs', being co-written by David Gilmour. For the cover artwork, a giant inflatable pig was commissioned and floated over Battersea Power Station. This became one of the enduring symbols of Pink Floyd and inflatable pigs were a staple of Pink Floyd's live shows from then on.

In The Flesh

The 1977 Pink Floyd - In The Flesh tour was the last time Pink Floyd performed a major tour with Roger Waters. The tour featured the famous inflatable puppets, notably a 40 foot pig balloon, and a 'Nuclear family' with Mother, Father and two and a half children, later the band added a Cadillac, a television and a fridge. It also had a pyrotechnic 'waterfall' and featured one of the biggest and most elaborate stages to date. Pink Floyd's market strategy for the Animals tour was very aggressive, filling pages of The New York Times and Billboard magazine. To promote their four-night run at Madison Square Garden in New York City, there was a Pink Floyd parade on 6th Avenue featuring pigs and sheep. During the tour Waters began to exhibit more aggressive behaviour, and would often yell abuse at disruptive audiences who wouldn't stop yelling and screaming during the quieter numbers. In the New York shows they had to use local workers as lighting technicians. They had several difficulties with the apparently incompetent workers, as Waters had to at one point beckon one of the spotlights to move higher when it only illuminated his lower legs and feet while he was singing. After having enough of this, Waters brought the whole band to a halt for a moment to remark "I think you New York lighting guys are a fucking load of shit!" and then continued the song. In the first half of the show, Pink Floyd played 'Animals', with 'Wish You Were Here' in the second. Although the 'Animals' album had not been as successful as the two previous ones, the band managed to sell out arenas and stadiums in America and Europe, setting scale and attendance records. In Chicago, the band played to an estimated audience of 95,000 and set an attendance record, in Cleveland, of over 80,000 people. They helped set another attendance record on the final night of the tour, in Montreal, where a festival that also featured Emerson, Lake and Palmer drew another 80,000-strong audience. That night, Waters spat in the face of a disruptive fan; The Wall grew out of Waters' thoughts about this incident, particularly his growing awareness that stardom had alienated him from his audience.

The Wall

Emerson, Lake and Palmer 1979's epic rock opera, The Wall, conceived mainly by Waters, developed themes of loneliness and failure of communication, inspired by Waters' feelings of having constructed a metaphoric wall between himself and his audience. This album gave Pink Floyd renewed acclaim and their only chart-topping single with "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)". The Wall also included the future concert staples Comfortably Numb and Run Like Hell, with the former in particular becoming a cornerstone of album-oriented rock and classic-rock radio playlists as well as one of the group's best-known songs. The album was co-produced by Bob Ezrin, a friend of Waters who shared songwriting credits on "The Trial" and from whom the band distanced themselves, after Ezrin talked about the album to a journalist relative. Despite never hitting #1 in U.K. (it made it to #3), The Wall spent an astounding 15 weeks atop the U.S. charts during 1980. It sold well over 20 million copies worldwide and is often regarded as the best-selling double album ever. It has been certified 23x platinum by RIAA, for sales of 11.5 million copies in U.S. alone. The huge commercial success of The Wall made Pink Floyd the only artist since the Beatles to have the best-selling albums of two years (1973 and 1980) in less than a decade. Even more so than during the Animals sessions, Waters was increasingly asserting his artistic influence and leadership over the band, prompting frequent conflicts with the other members, and the eventual firing of Wright from the band. Wright returned, on a fixed wage, for the album's live concerts. Ironically, Wright was the only member of Pink Floyd to make any money from the Wall shows, the rest having to cover the extensive costs.

The Wall Live

Pink Floyd mounted their most elaborate stage show in conjunction with the tour of The Wall. A band of session musicians played the first song, wearing rubber face masks (demonstrating that the individual members of the band were practically anonymous to the public), then backed up the band for the remainder of the show. Giant inflatable characters designed by Gerald Scarfe, including fully mobile giant puppets of a teacher and Pink's wife, with menacing spotlights for eyes, took the traditional inflatables to a whole new level. During the first half of the show, a huge wall was built, brick by enormous brick, between the audience and the band. There were 340 white bricks forming a 160 foot wall which stood 35 feet tall. The final brick was placed as Roger Waters sang "goodbye" at the end of the song "Goodbye Cruel World". For the second half of the show, the band were largely invisible, except for a hole in the wall that simulated a hotel room setting, where Roger Waters "acted out" the story of Pink, and an appearance by David Gilmour on top of the wall to perform the climactic guitar solo in "Comfortably Numb". Other parts of the story were told by Gerald Scarfe animations projected onto the wall itself (these animations were later integrated into the film version Pink Floyd: The Wall). At the finale of the concert, the specially-constructed wall was demolished amidst sound effects and a spectacular light show. It was the most ambitious theatrical show seen so far, much more expensive and complex than contemporaneous efforts by artists such as David Bowie, Alice Cooper and KISS. The costs of the tour were estimated to have reached US$ 1.5 million even before the first performance. The New York Times stated in its March 2 1980 edition that "The 'Wall' show remains a milestone in rock history though and there's no point in denying it. Never again will one be able to accept the technical clumsiness, distorted sound and meagre visuals of most arena rock concerts as inevitable" and concluded that "the 'Wall' show "will be the touchstone against which all future rock spectacles must be measured". The Wall concert was only performed a handful of times each in four cities: Los Angeles, Uniondale (Long Island), Dortmund, and London (at Earl's Court). The primary 'tour' occurred in 1980, but the band performed two more shows at Earl's Court in 1981 for filming, with the intention of being integrated into the upcoming movie. The resulting footage, however, was deemed substandard, and scrapped; years later, Roger Waters said that he had tried to locate this footage for historical purposes, but was unsuccessful, and he now considers it to be lost forever. There are, however, several unofficial videos of the entire live show in circulation. Gilmour and Mason attempted to convince Waters to expand the show for a more lucrative large-scale, stadium tour, but because of the nature of the material (one of the primary themes is the distance between an artist and his audience) Waters balked at this. In fact, Waters had reportedly been offered a guaranteed US$ 1 million for each additional stadium concert, but declined the offer, insisting that such a tour would be hypocritical. Waters later re-created the Wall show in 1990, amid the ruins of the Berlin Wall, joined by a number of guest artists (including Bryan Adams, Scorpions, Van Morrison, The Band, Tim Curry, Cyndi Lauper, Sinéad O'Connor, Marianne Faithfull, Joni Mitchell, and Thomas Dolby). This concert was even bigger than the previous ones. Roger Waters built a 591 foot long and 80 foot high wall. The theatrical features of The Wall concert were increased to gather the attention of a sold-out audience of 200,000 people and of other estimated 500 million, in 35 countries, to whom the show would be broadcast. After the concert began, the gates were opened and an estimated 300,000 to 500,000 people were able to watch the concert.

Film

A film (essentially a music video for the entire album) entitled "Pink Floyd: The Wall" was released in 1982. The film, written by Waters and directed by Alan Parker, starred Boomtown Rats founder Bob Geldof and featured striking animation by noted British cartoonist Gerald Scarfe. It grossed over US$ 22 million at the North American box office. A song which first appeared in the movie, When the Tigers Broke Free, was released as a single on a limited basis. This song was finally made widely availble on the complilation album Echoes and recent re-releases of The Final Cut.

The Final Cut

1983 saw the release of The Final Cut. Even darker in tone than The Wall, this album re-examined many previous themes, while also addressing then-current events, including Waters' anger at Britain's participation in the Falklands War ("The Fletcher Memorial Home") and his cynicism toward, and fear of, nuclear war ("Two Suns in the Sunset"). Michael Kamen and Andy Bown contributed keyboard work due to Wright's absence. Though technically released as a Pink Floyd album, the interior sleeve specified "A requiem for the post war dream by Roger Waters, performed by Pink Floyd": the project was clearly dominated by Waters and became a prototype in sound and form for later Waters solo projects (Roger Waters has since said that he offered to release the record as a solo album, but the rest of the band rejected this idea). Gilmour also reportedly asked Waters to hold back the release of the album by a year so he could contribute material, but was rejected by Waters. Only moderately successful by Floyd standards (UK #1, U.S. #6), the album yielded one minor rock radio hit, "Not Now John". The arguing between Waters and Gilmour by this stage was rumored to be so bad that they were never seen in the recording studio simultaneously. Gilmour even had his name removed from the production credits in protest over some of Waters' decisions. There was no tour.

David Gilmour-led era: 1987-1995

Andy Bown After The Final Cut, the band members went their separate ways, each releasing solo albums to varying degrees of success. Waters announced in December of 1985 that he was departing Pink Floyd describing the band as "a spent force creatively". However, in 1986 Gilmour and Mason began recording a new Pink Floyd album. (At the same time, Roger Waters was also working on his second solo album entitled Radio K.A.O.S.). A bitter legal dispute ensued with Waters claiming that the name "Pink Floyd" should have been put to rest, but Gilmour and Mason upheld their conviction that they had the legal right to continue as "Pink Floyd". High Court proceedings went in favor of Gilmour and Mason, much to the chagrin of Waters, and the two camps continued working.

Momentary Lapse of Reason

Gilmour and Mason returned to the studio, along with producer Bob Ezrin in 1986. Richard Wright also rejoined Gilmour and Mason during the final recording sessions of A Momentary Lapse of Reason (UK #3/U.S. #3) album, though he did not officially rejoin the band until the end of the subsequent tour. Gilmour later admitted that Mason had hardly played on the album. Because of Mason's limited contribution, many critics say that A Momentary Lapse of Reason should really be regarded as a Gilmour solo effort, in the way that The Final Cut can be seen as a Waters solo album. Having usually written only music with Waters responsible for drafting lyrics (the most recent Pink Floyd album to which Gilmour had contributed lyrics was Obscured by Clouds), Gilmour received further criticism for bringing writers from outside the band to assist him. After the release of A Momentary Lapse of Reason in 1987, Pink Floyd embarked on what was initially meant to be an 11-week tour to promote the album. The two remaining members of the band, David Gilmour and Nick Mason, along with Richard Wright, who still not yet officially a band member, had just won a legal battle against Roger Waters and the future of the group was uncertain. Following the band's tradition, the tour was huge: 45 trucks were needed to carry the equipment necessary to build the biggest outdoor stage to date, 85 feet (26 m) high and 98 feet (30 m) wide. Initially scheduled just to promote the album, it lasted until almost two years later, in 1989, after playing around 200 concerts, including 3 dates at Madison Square Garden and 2 nights at Wembley Stadium, to about 5.5 million people in total. The numbers of the tour speak for themselves: it made Pink Floyd the second highest grossing act of 1987 and the highest grossing of 1988 in the U.S. Financially, Pìnk Floyd was the biggest act of these two years combined, as it grossed almost US$ 60 million from touring, about the same as U2 and Michael Jackson, their closest rivals, put together. Worldwide, the band grossed around US$ 135 million. A further concert was held in 1990, at the Knebworth Festival in 1990, a charity event that also featured other Silver Clef Award winners. Pink Floyd was the last act to play, to an audience of 125,000. The £60,000 firework display that ended the concert was entirely financed by the band. They released a double live album taken from their 1988 Long Island shows, entitled Delicate Sound of Thunder. They later recorded some instrumentals for a classic-car racing film La Carrera Panamericana, set in Mexico and featuring Gilmour and Mason as participating drivers. At one part of the race Gilmour and Steve O'Rourke (his map-reader in the race) crashed. O'Rourke suffered a broken leg, but Gilmour walked away with just some bruises. The instrumentals are notable for including the first Floyd material co-written by Wright since 1975, as well as the only Floyd material co-written by Mason since Dark Side of the Moon. 1992 saw the box set release of Shine On. The 9 disc set included re-releases of the studio albums A Saucerful of Secrets; Meddle; The Dark Side of the Moon; Wish You Were Here; Animals; The Wall; and A Momentary Lapse of Reason. A bonus disc entitled The Pink Floyd Early Singles was also included. An interesting detail of the set's packaging is that when all the albums are stacked up, from the side they form the cover of The Dark Side of the Moon.

The Division Bell

The band's next recording was the 1994 release The Division Bell (UK #1/U.S. #1), which was much more of a group effort than A Momentary Lapse of Reason had been, with Wright now reinstated as a full and contributing band member. The album was generally received more favorably by critics and fans alike than Lapse had been, sounding more like the timeless Pink Floyd of old. Saxophonist Dick Parry, a contributor to the mid-70s Floyd albums, also returned to the fold. The ensuing tour was promoted by legendary Canadian concert impresario Michael Cohl and became the highest-grossing tour in rock history to that date, with the band playing the entirety of Dark Side of the Moon in some shows, the first time they had done so since 1975. The concerts featured a very large stage, a large round screen, incredible special effects, quadrophonic sound and powerful lasers. Three stages leapfrogged around North America and Europe, each 180 feet long and featuring a 130 foot arch modelled on the Hollywood Bowl. All in all, the tour required 700 tons of steel carried by 53 articulated trucks, a crew of 161 people and an initial investment of US$ 4 million plus US$ 25 million of running costs just to stage. It paid off. This tour played to 5.5 million people in 68 cities; each concert gathered an average 45,000 audience. At the end of the year, the Division Bell tour was announced as the biggest tour ever, with worldwide gross of over £150 million (about US$ 250 million). In the U.S. alone, it grossed US$ 103.5 million from 59 concerts. However, this record was short-lived; less than a year later, The Rolling Stones' Voodoo Lounge tour finished with a worldwide gross of over US$ 300 million. The Stones remain the only act ever to achieve a higher worldwide gross from a tour.

Solo work and more 1995-2004

Pink Floyd has not released any new studio material or toured since 1994's The Division Bell, nor is there a sign of any forthcoming, however the band released a live album entitled P
- U
- L
- S
- E in 1995. P
- U
- L
- S
- E hit #1 in U.S. and featured songs recorded during one of the record-breaking 14 presentations at Earl's Court, in London, which ended "The Division Bell" tour, and includes an entire performance of "Dark Side of the Moon" as well as other favourites from albums like "The Wall" and "Wish You Were Here". In 1996, the band performed Wish You Were Here with Billy Corgan (of The Smashing Pumpkins fame) at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction. A live recording of The Wall was released in 2000 compiled from their 1980/1981 London concerts, entitled Is There Anybody Out There? The Wall Live 1980-81. It hit #1 on Billboard Internet Album Sales chart, but managed to only hit #19 on U.S. charts. A two-disc set of their best-known tracks entitled Echoes was released in 2001. This compilation caused some controversy due to the songs segueing into one other non-chronologically, thereby presenting the material out of the context of the original albums. Some of the tracks ("Echoes", "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", "Marooned" and "High Hopes") have had substantial parts removed from them. Despite the controversy, the album sold over 200,000 copies in its first week and guaranteed a #2 on U.S. charts. David Gilmour released a solo concert DVD called David Gilmour in Concert in November 2002 which was compiled from shows on 2001-06-22, and 2002-01-17, at The Royal Festival Hall in London. Richard Wright, Robert Wyatt, and Bob Geldof (Pink in The Wall film) make guest appearances. In 2002 Q magazine named Pink Floyd as one of the "50 Bands To See Before You Die". Two years later, the same magazine would place Pink Floyd as the biggest band of all time, above the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin, according to a complex system for comparing bands which included album sales, charts performance and concerts attendance. In 2003, a 30th-Anniversary SACD reissue of Dark Side of the Moon, featuring high resolution surround sound was released with new artwork on the front cover and went on to sell over 800,000 copies. Longtime manager Steve O'Rourke died later that year on October 30, 2003. The three remaining band members performed "Fat Old Sun" and "The Great Gig in the Sky" at his funeral at Chichester Cathedral, contrary to reports in the media claiming they played "Wish You Were Here". In 2004 a remastered re-release of The Final Cut was released with the single "When the Tigers Broke Free" added. Mason's book, Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd, was published in 2004 in Europe and 2005 in the US. To promote it, Mason made public appearances in a few European and American cities, giving interviews and meeting fans at book signings. The book gives Mason's personal view of the band's experiences. There has been talk of Roger Waters doing a Broadway musical version of The Wall, with extra music to be written by Waters. The Broadway version will feature all of the music written by Waters but it is not known whether the songs co-written by Gilmour ("Young Lust", "Comfortably Numb", and "Run Like Hell") will feature. The 30th-Anniversary SACD reissue of Wish You Were Here is due early in 2006, also to feature high-resolution surround sound. Waters, Gilmour and Wright are reported to all be working on solo albums, with Waters' and Gilmour's due to be released in 2006.

Live 8, 2005-present

On July 2, 2005 Pink Floyd performed at the London Live 8 concert with Roger Waters rejoining David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Richard Wright. It was the quartet's first performance together in over 24 years — the band's last show with Waters was at Earls Court in London on June 17, 1981. 1981 Gilmour announced the Live 8 reunion on June 12, 2005:

Like most people I want to do everything I can to persuade the G8 leaders to make huge commitments to the relief of poverty and increased aid to the third world. It's crazy that America gives such a paltry percentage of its GNP to the starving nations. Any squabbles Roger and the band have had in the past are so petty in this context, and if re-forming for this concert will help focus attention then it's got to be worthwhile.

The band's set consisted of "Speak To Me/Breathe/Breathe Reprise", "Money", "Wish You Were Here" and "Comfortably Numb". As on the original recordings, Gilmour sang the lead vocals on "Breathe" and "Money", and shared them with Waters on Comfortably Numb. "Wish You Were Here" was the exception to this with Gilmour singing his usual verse, with Waters picking it up halfway through. During the guitar introduction of "Wish You Were Here", Waters said:

It's actually quite emotional standing up here with these three guys after all these years. Standing to be counted with the rest of you. Anyway, we're doing this for everyone who's not here, but particularly, of course, for Syd.

They were augmented by guitarist Tim Renwick (guitarist on Roger Waters' 1984 solo tour, who has since become Pink Floyd's backing guitarist on stage), keyboardist/guitarist Jon Carin (Pink Floyd's backing keyboardist from 1987 onward who has since performed on the 1999-2000 North American leg of Waters' "In The Flesh" solo tour), saxophonist Dick Parry during "Money" (who played on the original recordings of "Money", "Us And Them", and "Shine on You Crazy Diamond"), and backing singer Carol Kenyon during "Comfortably Numb". On the screen behind them, film of the iconic pig from the Animals album was shown flying over Battersea Power Station. Many fans expressed the hope that the Live 8 appearance would lead to a reunion tour and a record-breaking US$ 250 million deal for a world tour is said to have being offered to the band. At first, however, the band has made it very clear that there are no such plans at that time. In the weeks after the show, the rifts that separated the members during the breakup seemed to have largely healed. David Gilmour confirmed that he and Waters were on "pretty amicable terms" and that they communicated via e-mail after the concert. Nick Mason said that the band would be willing to perform for a concert "that would support Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts." Waters has offered what some see as conflicting comments on the issue, first saying, "Never say never [...] I mean, under sort of similar circumstances, or in some way, we might do things again" when questioned on the prospects of another performance. However in an interview in Rolling Stone, Waters appeared less optimistic: "I decided that if anything came up in rehearsals [for Live 8] — any difference of opinion — I would just roll over. And I did...I didn't mind rolling over for one day, but I couldn't roll over for a whole fucking tour". However, in an October, 2005 interview with Word Magazine, Waters stated he "really loved" playing with the band again and he held out some possibility of the band re-forming again. "I hope we do it again. If some other opportunity arose, I could even imagine us doing Dark Side of the Moon again - you know, if there was a special occasion. It would be good to hear it again". Also, Waters stated on a BBC2 Radio interview in September the possibility of a reunion album with Gilmour, Mason and Wright. In the week after Live 8, there was a revival of interest in Pink Floyd. According to record store chain HMV, sales of Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd went up, in the following week, by 1343%, while [http://www.amazon.co.uk Amazon.co.uk] reported increases in sales of The Wall at 3600%, Wish You Were Here at 2000%, Dark Side of the Moon at 1400% and Animals at 1000%. David Gilmour subsequently declared that he would donate all profits from this post Live 8 boom in sales to charity, and urged that all the other performing artists and their record companies should do the same. On 16 November 2005 Pink Floyd were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame, by Pete Townshend. Gilmour and Mason attended in person, explaining that Wright was in hospital following eye surgery, and Waters appeared on a video screen, from Rome. It was stated that the chance of a reunion album is practically nil, and that any future concerts would be in the same vein as Live 8. This was contradicted on the 25 November, when Waters stated that he was willing to play with Pink Floyd again as long as other members agreed [http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/pink_floyd_to_reunite.html].

The images of Pink Floyd

25 November one of the best album covers ever created.]] Integral to the music is the artwork that comes with it. The album covers and sleeve artwork add to the emotional impact of the music with vivid and meaningful imagery. Throughout the band's career, this aspect was mainly provided by the talents of photographer and graphic artist Storm Thorgerson and his erstwhile graphic studio Hipgnosis ("hip" gnosis or hypnosis). Many of these images have acquired fame in their own right; notably the famous picture of a man shaking the hand of his burning alter-ego for Wish You Were Here and the refracting prism for Dark Side of the Moon. The cover of Meddle also gave testament to the band's ideas about the visualization of sound with its close-up of the human ear accompanied by visible sound waves. In fact, Thorgerson was involved in all the artwork for every album except The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, the front cover of which was a photograph by Vic Singh and the back cover a drawing by Barrett; The Wall, for which the band employed Gerald Scarfe; and The Final Cut, the cover of which was designed by Waters himself, using photography made by his then brother-in-law, Willie Christie. A quote from Roger Waters from a video/DVD on the making of the Dark Side of the Moon album: "We always wanted to kind of... not be on our covers ourselves; not have pictures".

Discography and awards

:Main article: Pink Floyd has released 14 studio albums, three live albums, one half live and half studio, and several compilations. Their albums have won numerous awards.

Bootlegs

Pink Floyd is one of the heaviest-bootlegged bands in history, with bootleg recordings of the band numbering at least in the hundreds. Collectors of these bootlegs often call them RoIOs, or Recordings of Illegal/Illegitimate Origin. The vast majority of these are audience recordings of their various concerts, as only a few studio outtakes and soundboard recordings have leaked to bootleggers. The most popular exceptions are the unreleased Syd Barrett songs "Scream Thy Last Scream" and "Vegetable Man", but there are others as well. Many bootlegs before the 1990's featured singles such as "Candy and a Currant Bun" that had not been released on compilation discs, but these disappeared when the The Early Singles disc in the Shine On box set was released. Collecting bootlegs is usually easy, as the internet has made bootleg sales for profit largely pointless. Organizations such as Harvested have made a hobby of cleaning up and remastering bootleg recordings and issuing them to traders for free. The hundreds of audience recordings vary in quality from excellent (concerts in 1994 and 1988) to abysmal (the era between 1967 and 1971). Audience noise is often absent, because audiences of the band in their early days were very quiet. There are sometimes recordings of standout quality in a period of otherwise low-quality recordings; an example is the Electric Factory show in late 1970, which was nearly soundboard-quality during a period when most other recordings were extremely poor. (Audience recordings would not regularly be as good as the Electric Factory show until 1988). Other standouts include the "Fireman" source of the Hollywood Bowl concert in 1972, in which a complete rendition of the pre-release "prototype" Dark Side of the Moon suite was played, and an excellent recording of a 1975 show taped by the legendary taper Mike Millard. This recording contains the best-existing versions of the unreleased Pink Floyd songs "Raving and Drooling" and "You've Got to Be Crazy", which would eventually become "Sheep" and "Dogs", respectively. One of the most useful bootlegs is A Tree Full Of Secrets, a massive 18-disc collection of all Pink Floyd material which ignores live recordings but includes all material released on albums outside the Pink Floyd discography (such as movie soundtracks), radio advertisements, television performances, studio outtakes, rehearsals and alternative mono/stereo remixes. It also features considerable solo material from Pink Floyd's members. It is the definitive collection of all Floyd rarities, and even includes materials suspected of being fake for the sake of completeness and allowing the listener to decide.

Band members

Classic line-up

- David Gilmour - guitar, vocals (1968 - present)
- Nick Mason - drums (1965 - present)
- Roger Waters - bass, vocals, sole lyrics from 1973 until departure (1965 - 1985, Live 8 appearance in 2005)
- Richard Wright - keyboards, vocals (1965 - 1981, 1986 - present)

Former members

- Syd Barrett - guitar, vocals, lyrics (1965 - 1968)
- Bob Klose - guitar (1965-1966; does not appear on any of Pink Floyd's recorded output)

Bibliography

- For about ten years from 1982, a fanzine, "The Amazing Pudding", documented and archived the band's activities.
- In 1991 Nicholas Schaffner's book Saucerful of Secrets: The Pink Floyd Odyssey (ISBN 0517576082), an in-depth biography of the band, was released.
- In 2001, 'Lost in the Woods: Syd Barrett and the Pink Floyd' (ISBN 0-7522-2328-3) by Julian Palacios, on Syd Barrett and his time in the group, was released.
- In 2004 Nick Mason's book Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd (ISBN 0297843877) was released.
- Another Brick In The Wall: The Stories Behind Every Pink Floyd Song, By Cliff Jones (ISBN 0553067338) was released in 1996 by Carlton Books, records details about how each song was written and recorded throughout Floyd's history, from Piper at the Gates Of Dawn (67) right up until Pulse in 1995.

External links

Official links

- [http://www.pinkfloyd.co.uk/ Pink Floyd official site]
- [http://www.pinkfloyd.com/ Pink Floyd official U.S. site]
- [http://www.roger-waters.com/ Roger Waters official site]

Resources links

- [http://www.pinkfloydarchives.com/ Pink Floyd Archives] - Resource of illustrated discogs, concerts, books, etc. by the author of The Pink Floyd Encyclopedia

The Wall

:For the movie based on the album, see Pink Floyd The Wall (film). The Wall is a rock opera and concept album by Pink Floyd. Hailed by critics and fans as one of Pink Floyd's best albums (along with Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here), the album is known as a rock and roll classic, and its morbid, depressing anthems have inspired many contemporary rock musicians. This was the final Pink Floyd album to feature Richard Wright until his return in 1986. Roger Waters was inspired to create the album during a 1977 concert tour for Animals, dubbed Pink Floyd — In The Flesh. In Montreal, a fan's disruptive behaviour resulted in Waters spitting in the fan's face. Immediately disgusted with himself, Waters came up with the idea of building a wall between him and the audience, an idea which would later develop into the album. All of the songs were penned by Roger Waters with the exceptions of "Young Lust", "Comfortably Numb" and "Run Like Hell" which were co-written by David Gilmour and "The Trial", which was co-written by Bob Ezrin. The album has been certified 23 times platinum and hit #1 on the Billboard Album Charts in 1980. Originally released on Columbia Records in the US and Harvest Records in the UK, The Wall was then re-released as a digitally remastered CD in 1994 in the UK on EMI. Columbia issued the remastered CD in 1997 in the US and rest of the world. For The Walls 20th Anniversary in early 2000, Capitol Records in the US and EMI for the rest of the world outside the US re-released the 1997 remastered CD. In 1998 Q magazine readers voted The Wall the 65th greatest album of all time. In 2001, the Canadian alternative country band Luther Wright and the Wrongs released Rebuild the Wall, a track-for-track reimagining of The Wall as a country album.
Concept
The album's concept and most of the songs are by Waters. The storyline portrays the fictional life of an anti-hero named Pink Floyd, who is hammered and beaten down by society from the earliest days of his life: having lost his father (killed in Anzio during World War II, as was Waters' own), smothered by his over-protective mother and oppressed at school by tyrannical, abusive teachers who tried to crush him and the other pupils into the "right" shape for society. Pink withdraws into his own fantasy world, building an imaginary wall to isolate himself from the rest of the world. Every bad experience in his life is a brick in that wall. He becomes a rock star and gets married, only to be cheated on by his wife due to his distance and coldness. Pink slowly goes insane behind his freshly completed wall. Unable to escape, he calls for help, only realizing now that it is too late. Doctors are brought in to give him drugs to keep him going through his shows. Hallucinating, Pink believes that he is a fascist dictator, and his concerts are Neo-Nazi rallies where he sics his men on fans he considers unworthy, only to have his conscience rebel at this and put himself on trial, his inner judge ordering him to tear down his wall in order to open himself to the outside world.
Demo version
In 2003, the entire band demo tape for the album leaked onto the Internet, featuring remarkably different versions of many songs, and a three-part version of "Is There Anybody Out There?". The differences include:
- "In The Flesh (1)" has lyrics that are in the finished version of "In The Flesh (2)".
- "The Happiest Days Of Our Lives" is slower, and focuses on one teacher, rather than all of them.
- "Another Brick In The Wall (Part II)" is more like "Another Brick In The Wall (Part I)".
- "Mother" is faster-paced.
- "Young Lust" is entirely instrumental.
- "One Of My Turns" features entirely different dialogue from the groupie, and is slower paced.
- "What Shall We Do Now" is much slower paced than the version featured in the film.
- "Is There Anybody Out There (Part I)" consists of the instrumental interlude featured in the finished version.
- "Is There Anybody Out There (Part II)" features a previously unheard verse.
- "Is There Anybody Out There (Part III)" is much more like the finished version, although mainly instrumental.
- "Comfortably Numb" has almost entirely different lyrics which are much darker in tone.
- "The Show Must Go On" features a previously unheard verse.
- "In The Flesh (2)" features Roger Waters singing in a German accent.
- "Run Like Hell" is entirely instrumental. The rest of the tracks are basically the same as their finished counterparts, with perhaps a different lyric or riff here and there.
Recorded version
During recording, Richard Wright was fired from the band but stayed on to finish the album and perform the live concerts as a paid musician. According to co-producer/engineer James Guthrie, he played on more than half of the album. Toni Tennille, of Captain & Tennille, contributed to the song One of My Turns, speaking the part of a groupie who is invited back to Pink's trailer Around the world, the album produced a number of hit singles for Pink Floyd, including "Another Brick In The Wall (Part 2)", "Young Lust", "Hey You", "Comfortably Numb" and "Run Like Hell". For "Another Brick in the Wall (Part II)", Pink Floyd needed a school choir, and approached music teacher Alun Renshaw of Islington Green, around the corner from their Britannia Row Studios, in the middle of a lesson. The choir were not allowed to hear the rest of the song after singing the chorus, and were let down, as they wanted to hear Gilmour's solo. The chorus was overdubbed 12 times to give the impression that the choir was larger. Though the school received a lump sum payment of 1000 GBP, there was no contractual arrangement for royalties. Under 1996 UK copyright law, they became eligible, and after choir members were tracked down by royalties agent Peter Rowan of [http://www.rblmusic.com RBL Music], through the website Friends Reunited, they sued. Music industry professionals estimated that each student would be owed around 500 GBP.
Concert version
Pink Floyd performed the concert version of The Wall only a handful of times, in New York, Los Angeles, London, and Dortmund. This was due to the grandiosity of the performance, which involved constructing a giant wall across the stage between band and audience, not to mention staple Pink Floyd props such as giant screens, flying pigs and pyrotechnics. The performances began with the band in full view, with the giant wall being constructed by roadies out of 420 cardboard bricks throughout the first half of the performance. In the second half, the band would be completely obscured from view behind the wall, but still playing, while extra parts were played in front of the wall by a "surrogate band" composed of Andy Brown on bass, Snowy White on guitar, Willie Wilson on drums and Peter Wood on keyboards. The surrogate band wore masks of the faces of their counterparts in the real band. While playing lead guitar on "Comfortably Numb", guitarist David Gilmour was hoisted hydraulically on to the top of the wall, where he played his famous guitar solo in full view of the crowd. The wall was event

Goodbye Cruel World (song)

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The Wall

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