Pink Floyd

History of Pink Floyd

The Countdown Club in London was the venue for the band’s first gig in January of 1966. Syd Barrett(guitar), Nick Mason(drums), Roger Waters(bass; formerly George Waters) and Rick Wright(keyboards) played for 5 hours for a meagre £15!

February of the following year marked their entrance to professionalism as a TV documentary went to air featuring them performing in their local, the UFO Club. By the end of March 1967, the band had signed a record deal with EMI, released their first single entitled ‘Arnold Layne’ and started working on their first album, http://www.pinkfloydonline.com/discography/tpatgod.html ‘The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn’], at the infamous Abbey Road Studios.

Things were looking great for the young band until Syd’s LSD (acid) habit began to rage out of control, as seen during the three Top Of The Pops performances the band made in a 2 week period, where he noticeably lost interest in his appearance. Syd’s ability to perform worsened. Things finally came to a head after a few TV interviews of the band where Syd showed no reaction to questions and failing to turn up or seemingly unable to perform at several venues of the band’s European and US tours. The rest of the band asked him to leave on the 2nd of March 1968, soon after which he was institutionalised as a direct result of his drug abuse.

David Gilmour took over Syd’s position as guitarist, since he’d been covering for Syd’s ‘blank moments’ throughout the band’s tours. This was met with some discontent amongst fans, demonstrated during a visit to Chicago where David’s Telecaster guitar was stolen. Pink Floyd’s second album, with their new guitarist, was released in June 1968, entitled ‘A Saucerful Of Secrets’. From then until 1973, Pink Floyd became increasingly successful, touring the world, releasing new albums and recording music for various films.

The pinnacle of the band’s career came with the release of their album ‘Dark Side Of The Moon’ on the 24th of March 1973, hitting number one in the Album Charts only 4 days later! Just before the release of another hit album, ‘Wish You Were Here’ (originally dedicated to Syd), Roger Waters lost control at a fan who was screaming wildly and trying to get on stage during a performance. Roger spat at the fan, which, although he later regretted the incident, gave rise to thoughts about building a wall of sorts between themselves and the public. This idea was developed in 1979 with the release of ‘The Wall’ (later to be edited for ‘The Wall’ film, starring Bob Geldof), minus Rick Wright, who was dropped during the final recording sessions. This album was a big hit with the UK and the US. Pink Floyd spent the whole of 1980 and most of ’81 on a massive ‘The Wall’ tour, employing various new musicians along the way.

After much tension, disagreement and a few album releases, including ‘The Final Cut’, the band members went their separate ways in 1984 and recorded their own solo albums. A reformation of the band was discussed by David Gilmour and Nick Mason, which was promptly followed by a major lawsuit, filed by Roger Waters, for the rights to the music and the name of the band. The case was thrown out of court because there had never been any kind of contract written up. Roger did, however, get the right to perform Pink Floyd numbers at his solo gigs and also retained the rights to ‘The Final Cut’ and ‘The Wall’.

David Gilmour and Nick Mason went on to release ‘A Momentary Lapse Of Reason’ under the name Pink Floyd in 1986, while Roger continued his solo career. David and Nick toured for 3 years along with a number of other musicians, including Rick Wright, who rejoined the band.

After 3 years of inactivity, ‘The Division Bell’ was recorded in 1993 and later released, closely followed by a very successful 6 month tour. Pink Floyd was added to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996.

No concerts were performed after that but a new live album was released consisting of material from ‘The Wall’ tours of ‘80-’81. 2001 saw the band reunited, including Roger Waters and Syd Barrett, for the release of a new album, ‘Echoes’, which was a great success.

Speculation

2005’s Live8 concert saw the original Pink Floyd line-up together again. They commented that the quarrels that went on within the band were little reason not to take part in performing for such a good cause. Speculation arose, fuelled by the media, that the band would tour again but Roger, Nick, David and Rick have all maintained that this is not true.

Hopefully, this is not the end of such a musically talented group of artists. Their music reflects a great deal of thought and feeling, no doubt resulting from the various events that took place throughout the band’s history.

Albums

• Animals
• Atom Heart Mother
• Dark Side Of The Moon
• Delicate Sound Of Thunder
• The Division Bell
• The Final Cut
• Meddle
• A Momentary Lapse Of Reason
• More
• Obscured By Clouds
• Piper At The Gates Of Dawn
• Pulse
• Relics
• A Saucerful Of Secrets
• The Wall
• Ummagumma
• Wish You Were Here

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