PINK FLOYD: The Wall (PROGRESSIVE ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

After "Tommy" by The Who and "The lamb lies down on Broadway" by Genesis, "The Wall" is the third of a trilogy that has rocked the seventies. Released at five-year intervals, with similarities in their scripts, and each transcending a personal delirium of a band member, these three double-albums are essential.

"The Wall" was adulated, then decried by those who saw it as a pompous and selfish work. A simplistic and opportunistic scheme. "The Wall" was written in 1979, the year in which Pink Floyd single-handedly symbolises itself the crisis of progressive music: the break-up of the band and the loss of inspiration. Waters was both the last hope of the four musicians (he was the only one still composing) and the worst threat: megalomania was looming over him.

The album might never have been released under the band's name. But that year, Pink Floyd got to know that their fortune had been lost by their business manager. Waters suggested a suitable solution by offering to release a record. He had just written two scripts, and his three colleagues chose "The Wall" (the other would become Waters' first solo album: "The pros and cons of hitch-hiking"). The task was daunting and exciting. David Gilmour agreed to take on the task, and only Wright, who was at odds with Waters, was able to move backwards in the studio.

The story is that of Pink, a young singer who in fact symbolises Waters himself. His career is advancing and the star system is consuming him and destroying his mind: a failed marriage, psychopathic fans. Added to this is Waters' sad childhood: a father who died in battle before he was born, an abusive mother, and a tyrannical school system. All of this creates a kind of wall between Pink/Waters and the rest of the world, and he dreams of watching that wall crumbling.

Although he includes some external elements (allusions to Syd Barrett's tragic fate, a critique of dictatorships and media violence...), the autobiographical aspect is obvious, but it does not detract from the album. On the contrary, Waters has really put all his heart and soul into this record, which has stolen nothing of its success. This whole crazy story is musically in place, the songs follow each other with fluidity. There is some poetic ("Nobody Home"), some hard ("In the Flesh", a titanic opening), some typically gliding Floydian ("Comfortably Numb", one of the best songs in the band's history, and which was composed by Gilmour)... The record concludes with "the Trial", a baroque musical edifice with symphonic glamour overtones. This extraordinary song owes much to conductor Michael Kamen, a contemporary genius who turned everything he touched into gold.

"The Wall" is by no means the monument of hubris that some would have you make it out to be. If Waters is undoubtedly the captain who sabotaged the Pink Floyd ship, he signs here a masterpiece which cannot be ignored by any rock fan.
- Official website

PINK FLOYD

THE WALL

EMI

PROGRESSIVE ROCK