Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Pink Floyd on stage in July 2010


OK it isn’t Pink Floyd but it is David Gilmour and Roger Waters playing live on stage together on 10 July 2010 for the first time since Live 8 in 2005, which was the first time they had played together for nearly 25 years. The clip has zero production values – marginally above a mobile phone – but is essential viewing for any Floyd fan. The embedding above is uncertain: the best viewing is at the home page here.

Waters’ voice is shot – as always, he barks rather than sings, only more so – and even Gilmour strains for the high notes occasionally, but still, it’s them. For 27 minutes. Last month. And the guitar playing is fabulous – horribly recorded but you can tell that Gilmour got an amazing sound out of small equipment in a small room. And he uses more pinched harmonics than usual, the show-off.

This is back at Jemima Khan’s place, Kiddington Hall, in front of 200 people (Kate Moss, yada yada). Nick Cave also performed as did Tom Jones and others.

The performance starts about a minute in. They play “To Know Him is to Love Him”, a delightful choice given the long animosity between Gilmour and Waters (who is gracious throughout), then “Wish You Were Here”, “Comfortably Numb” and “Another Brick in the Wall”. 

The show was a charity gig for the Hoping Foundation and raised some £430,000 for Palestinian refugee children in Gaza, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and the West Bank. Details here and here.

1 comment:

Phil said...

Ab Fab - but the usual phenom of persons who don't give a shite about the music - gabbling in the background. They are there to be seen by others and have no clue, or interest in, what's on stage.