| Roger Waters |
Article Index for Roger |
Website Links For Roger |
Information AboutRoger Waters |
George Roger Waters (born September 6 , 1943 ) is an English Rock musician; Singer , Guitarist , Bassist , Songwriter , and Composer . He is best known for his 1965 - 1985 career with the band Pink Floyd (he was credited as their main songwriter, after the departure of Syd Barrett ), Bass player and one of their lead vocalists (along with David Gilmour and, to a lesser extent, Rick Wright ). He was also the lyrical mastermind behind many of the band's Concept Album s, especially '' The Dark Side Of The Moon '', '' Wish You Were Here '', '' Animals '', '' The Wall '', and '' The Final Cut '', and their well known symbols including the Pink Floyd Pigs and the marching hammers. Following this, he began a moderately successful solo career releasing three studio albums and staging one of the largest concerts ever, '' The Wall Concert In Berlin '' in 1990. In 2005, he released an Opera , '' Ça Ira '' and joined Pink Floyd at the Live 8 concert in London , on July 2 , for their first public performance with Waters in 24 years. BIOGRAPHY (1944-1965) Early years Waters was born George Roger Waters in Great Bookham , Surrey near Leatherhead , and grew up in Cambridge . Although his father Eric Fletcher Waters had been a Communist and ardent Pacifist , he fought in World War II and died in Action At Anzio in 1944, when Roger was only five months old. Waters would refer or allude to the loss of his father throughout his work, especially on '' The Final Cut '' album from 1983 (which is dedicated to his father) and the song named '' When The Tigers Broke Free '', first used in the movie version of '' The Wall ''. However, he has said that the Mother character from the latter album was nothing like his own. Distrust of authority, particularly government, educational, and military institutions, is a recurring theme in Waters' writing. This theme is clearly expressed in '' When The Tigers Broke Free '' as Waters expresses what he felt was a hollow and patronizing response to his father's sacrifice at Anzio: "And kind old King George sent Mother a note when he heard that Father was gone. He and Syd Barrett attended the Morley Memorial Junior School on Hills Road, Cambridge, and later both attended the Cambridge County School For Boys (now Hills Road Sixth Form College), while fellow band member David Gilmour attended The Perse School on the same road 1. He met Nick Mason and Richard Wright while attending the Regent Street Polytechnic school of architecture. He was a keen sportsman and was fond of swimming in the River Cam at Grantchester Meadows . At 15 he was chair of YCND in Cambridge. (1965-1985) Pink Floyd years In 1965, Roger Waters co-founded Pink Floyd (after many different incarnations - see Pink Floyd ) along with Syd Barrett , Richard Wright and Nick Mason . Although Barrett initially did most of the songwriting for the band, Waters wrote the song " Take Up Thy Stethoscope And Walk " on their debut LP, '' The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn ''. The album was a critical success and positioned the band for stardom. Barrett's deteriorating mental health led to increasingly erratic behaviour, rendering him unable to continue in his capacity as Pink Floyd's lead singer and guitarist. Waters attempted to coerce his friend into psychiatric treatment; this proved unhelpful, and the band approached David Gilmour to replace Barrett at the end of 1967. Even the band's former managers felt that Pink Floyd would not be able to sustain its initial success without the talented Barrett. Filling the void left by Barrett's departure, Waters began to chart Pink Floyd's new artistic direction. The lineup with Gilmour and Waters eventually brought Pink Floyd to prominence, producing a series of albums in the 1970s that remain among the most critically acclaimed and best-selling records of all time. In 1970, Waters collaborated with British composer such as '' The Dark Side Of The Moon '' and '' Wish You Were Here '', for which he wrote all of the lyrics and some of the music. After this, Waters became the primary songwriter, composing '' Animals '' and '' The Wall '' largely by himself (though continuing to collaborate with Gilmour on music). Waters' band-mates were happy to allow him to write the band's lyrics and guide its conceptual direction while they shared the opportunity to contribute musical ideas (Gilmour described Waters as "a very good motivator and obviously a great lyricist,"2 even at the height of the acrimony between them in 1995). Some of the band's most popular and beloved songs, including "Echoes", "Time", "Us and Them", "Wish You Were Here" and "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", feature the strong synergy of Waters' sharp lyrical instincts combined with the melodic talent of Gilmour, the soft, precise drumming of Nick Mason, and atmospheric patterns of keyboardist Richard Wright ("Us and Them", for instance, began as a sweetly melodic Wright keyboard instrumental and gained poignancy when Waters added plaintive antiwar lyrics). Unfortunately, this give-and-take relationship began to dissolve: a consequence of the band's collective ennui, according to Waters. Songwriting credits were a source of contention in these difficult years; Gilmour has noted that his contributions to tracks like "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II", with its blistering '', characterizing Waters as being egomaniacal at times. It was while recording ''The Wall'' that Waters decided to fire Wright, after Wright's personal problems began to affect the album production. Wright stayed with the band as a paid session musician while Waters led the band through a complete performance of his opus on every night of the brief tour that followed (for which Gilmour acted as musical director). In 1983 , the last Waters-Gilmour-Mason collaboration, ''The Final Cut'', was released. The sleeve notes describe it as being a piece "by Roger Waters" that was "performed by Pink Floyd" (rather than an actual Pink Floyd record). So, to many the album came across more like a Roger Waters solo album than Pink Floyd. It was the lowest selling Pink Floyd album in a decade without a hit single. Gilmour unsuccessfully tried to delay production on the album until he could author more material; Waters refused, and in 1985, he proclaimed that the band had dissolved due to irreconcilable differences. The ensuing battle between Waters and Gilmour over the latter's intention to continue to use the name "Pink Floyd" descended into threatened lawsuits and public bickering in the press. Waters claimed that, as the original band consisted of himself, Syd Barrett, Nick Mason and Richard Wright, Gilmour could not reasonably use the name "Pink Floyd" now that it was without three of its founding members. Another of Waters' arguments was that he had written almost all of the band's lyrics and a great part of the music after Barrett's departure. However, through agreement, Gilmour and Mason won the right to use the name and a majority of the band's songs, though Waters did retain the rights to the albums ''The Wall'' (save for three of the songs that Gilmour co-wrote), Animals, and The Final Cut, as well as claiming ownership of the famous Pink Floyd Pigs . For many fans and casual listeners, the collaborative years of 1971-1979 remain the "classic" Pink Floyd years due to the albums released and prominence of Pink Floyd in music culture; a 1987 end-of-year review in Rolling Stone noted that Waters' solo effort '' Radio K.A.O.S. '' and the post-Waters Pink Floyd album '' A Momentary Lapse Of Reason '', if taken together, might have made a nice follow-up to '' Dark Side Of The Moon ''. In 2005, Waters agreed to rejoin Pink Floyd on stage for Live 8, and on July 2, 2005, Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Nick Mason, and Rick Wright performed together onstage for the first time since the June 1981 ''Wall'' concerts at Earl's Court in London. (1985-2005) Early solo years After his departure from Pink Floyd , Waters embarked on a solo career producing three Concept Album s and a movie soundtrack which did not garner impressive sales. His solo work has managed critical acclaim and even some comparison to previous work with Pink Floyd.3. His first truly solo album, 1984 's '' The Pros And Cons Of Hitch Hiking '', was a project about a man's dreams in a night. The list of musicians helping Waters during recording included legendary guitarist Eric Clapton and jazz saxophonist David Sanborn . Conceived around the same time as ''The Wall'', the concept was shown to the Pink Floyd members, but they preferred ''The Wall'' over ''The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking''. The album had been demoed by Waters at the same time as The Wall, but the band had voted it too personal. Waters decided to shelve it until he could do it as a solo project. The album received mixed reviews, with Kurt Loder describing ''Pros And Cons Of Hitch Hiking'' in Rolling Stone as a "strangely static, faintly hideous record," adding that "Waters sounds like the kind of guy who'd bring Hershey Bars and Nylons along on a first date." (Loder gave the album one star out of five, though user ratings have averaged four out of five).4 On the other end of the spectrum, Mike DeGagne of the All Music Guide praised the album for its "ingenious symbolism and his brilliant use of stream of consciousness within a subconscious realm," rating it four out of five stars.http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:f04gtq2ztu4a All Music Guide In 1986 Waters contributed songs to the soundtrack of the movie '' When The Wind Blows ''. His backing band, featuring Paul Carrack , was credited as "The Bleeding Hearts Band". In 1987 Waters (still accompanied by the Bleeding Hearts Band, although not always credited as such) released another concept album, '' Radio K.A.O.S. '', about a man named Billy who can hear radio waves in his head. Waters followed the release with a supporting tour, also in 1987. The sound system for the arena portion of the tour used numerous speakers which created a Surround Sound effect. His album did not garner the impressive sales he had achieved in Pink Floyd. One possible reason was that he was now competing with a reformed Pink Floyd who were touring to support their latest release, '' A Momentary Lapse Of Reason ''. At the time Waters was quoted to have said "I'm competing against myself and losing." After the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 , Waters staged A Gigantic Charity Concert Of ''The Wall'' In Berlin on July 21 , 1990 to commemorate the end of the division between East and West Germany . The concert took place on Potsdamer Platz (a location which was part of the former "no-man's land" of the Berlin Wall), featured many guest superstars, and was one of the biggest concerts ever staged with an attendance of over 300,000 and watched live by over 5 million people worldwide. 1992 's '' Amused To Death '', about the corrupting, desensitising nature of Television , is perhaps Waters' most critically acclaimed solo recording, with music critics comparing it to later Pink Floyd work, such as ''The Wall''. The album had one hit which was " What God Wants , Pt. 1" which hit #4 on Mainstream Rock charts. Jeff Beck , another legendary guitarist, saw action on Waters' album as he played lead guitar. There was no tour in support of this record, Waters would later perform several songs from this record nearly eight years later on his In The Flesh tours. In 1999 Waters embarked on the In The Flesh tour which saw him performing some of his most famous work, both solo and Pink Floyd material. The tour was a success in the US, and after Waters had booked mostly smaller venues (after the letdown in attendance from his 1987 tour), tickets sold so well that most of the concerts had to be upgraded to larger venues. With Gilmour's Pink Floyd retiring after 1994, and many Floyd albums selling at the pace of Beatles records, Waters was in great demand. The tour eventually stretched across the world. Tickets were at such high demand, that the tour had to be spanned over three years. Almost every show was sold out with some venues garnering more sales than Pink Floyd shows of early touring years. One concert (Filmed in Portland, Oregon) was released on CD and DVD, named '' In The Flesh Live '', after the tour. During this tour he played two new songs from his next solo album, "Flickering Flame" and "Each Small Candle", as the final encore to the show. In 2002 Waters performed at a concert organised by the performing many classic Pink Floyd songs. This was the first time a special speaker system had been set up among the Glastonbury audience to enable sound effects to appear to be moving around amongst the crowd. Miramax Films announced in mid-2004 that a production of ''The Wall'' was to appear on Broadway with Waters playing a prominent part in its production. Reports stated that the musical contained not only the original tracks from ''The Wall'', but also songs from '' Dark Side Of The Moon '', '' Wish You Were Here '' and other Pink Floyd albums, as well as new material. 5 On the night of 1 May 2004 , the Overture for '' Ça Ira '' was pre-premièred on occasion of the '' Welcome Europe '' celebrations in the accession country of Malta , performed over Grand Harbour in Valletta and illuminated by light artist Gert Hof . The event was broadcast over all EBU television stations. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|