I nearly got trampled by pig handlers at Coachella. More specifically, I had my iPhone raised in the air, trying to get a nice snapshot of the undercarriage of the giant inflatable pig Roger Waters sent soaring out over the crowd, when I noticed just in the nick of time the handful of very serious-looking, flashlight-wielding, rope-holding roadies about to mow me down as they led the porcine wonder around the main stage’s field. I got out of the way but failed to get the desired photo of the porker’s belly, which was inscribed with the word “Obama” and a check mark next to it. Was this presidential endorsement the ex-Pink Floyd frontman’s, or the sinister pig’s? The former, we can believe, since Waters reportedly also commissioned a plane to fly over and simultaneously drop Obama leaflets, though we on the field saw none of them and they blew into nearby residential neighborhoods, instantly ensuring that the litter-hating desert cities of Indio and La Quinta will swing wildly for McCain in November. Anyhow, the highlight of the show came minutes later when the bovine wranglers let go of the ropes and let the pig float up to that great gig in the sky. I keep waiting for its deflated carcass to show up on eBay any minute and make some reservist in Twenty-Nine Palms a fortune, but no luck yet.
I would like to dub this installment of PopWatch “PropWatch,” since Waters has always been big on inflatable stuff and giant puppets in his shows. I was permanently warped, as an impressionable youth, by the original Animals tour in 1977, which marked the first time Pink Floyd sent critters over stadium crowds. Back then, the pig was pink and unmarked by political graffiti and had a set of glowing red eyes that appeared to be seeking out concert-goers to slaughter, as a sinister symbol of fascism. It was grandiose and it actually meant something vaguely political, too — what a perfect combination for a kid with budding pretensions as big as mine. Somehow, though, on that summer night in ’77, this awesome symbol of oppression seemed just a little less evil when it got stuck right over the middle of Cleveland Stadium and couldn’t be reeled back in after the Floyd had finished “Sheep.” In a slightly Spinal Tappish moment, the band had to stop the show and the house lights came up while for about 20 minutes the authorities figured out how to retrieve the recalcitrant porker. No wonder that, more than 30 years later, Waters is apparently mass-manufacturing his pigs and just letting ‘em go into the ether when they’ve served their purpose.
Waters’ set climaxed the three-day Coachella Festival, and it drewthe kind of massive crowd that Prince had been greeted with theprevious night, as opposed to the minimal welcome wagon that showed upfor Jack Johnson on night one. But this followed a lot of grumblingfrom Coachella veterans who felt that Waters’ booking — to play a 1973album, The Dark Side of the Moon, in its entirety, along withselected other classic-rock staples — was a betrayal of the festival’sindie-rock principles. To see if these heated objections had any legalvalidity, I tried looking up the fest’s philosophical bylaws, and —surprise! — there aren’t any. Organizers are perfectly free to book theSteve Miller Band for the main stage next year if they so desire, andwith the lack of commercially viable new acts emerging in any strain ofrock nowadays, it may come to something close to that eventually. But Ithink there’s a case to be made for booking Waters at a festival likethis… though I think I could make the case a lot better than the oneRog made for himself in his fairly dispiriting Sunday night set.
I will make the argument that the run of Pink Floyd albums from 1971’s Meddle through 1979’s The Wallis as solid a run of records as anyone has made in rock, including theBeatles, Stones, Who, and any number of more rock-critically correctbands. The legend goes that the Sex Pistols were formed in revoltagainst the pomp and circumstance that Pink Floyd represented, but I’vealways thought that Johnny Rotten and Roger Waters were two peas in apod, in their mutual misanthropy. Dark Side of the Moon, forall its seemingly spacey tropes, is a relatively down-to-earth albumabout insanity, cynicism, torpor, and the encroaching inevitability ofdeath — so no wonder it’s one of the most enduringly popular albums ofall time, right? Waters’ crankiness was a little less disguised bystoner-baiting sonic splendor on Animals, as nasty a piece ofwork as you could find in the late ‘70s, or now. Remove some of RickWright’s slightly dated synth lines and the stuff holds upexceptionally well.
Except Waters isn’t removing any of Rick Wright’s slightly datedsynth lines, or any other element of the original records. He seemsconvinced — and is probably right, unfortunately — that most of hisboomer fans want to hear the songs recreated exactly as first created,from every drumbeat to every ambient quadraphonic sound effect. And sowhat we got Sunday night was the world’s greatest Pink Floyd tributeband. To be fair, this isn’t much different than the approach eternallyestranged Floyd co-frontman David Gilmour took on his last tour, but atleast there, Gilmour did have Rick Wright and the group’s originalsax-playing sideman along for the ride, so you could almost forgive himfor his control-freak exactitude. But whether he wants to include anyof the songs Gilmour sang lead on or not, Waters has to do somethingabout those brilliant guitar parts. Plus, by doing Dark Side in its entirety now, he isincorporating a lot of Gilmour-sung material. His solution, for Gilmourand the other missing guys, is to hire ringers who can do every oncesemi-spontaneous riff and lick note-for-note. You want me to defend that preserved-in-amber fussiness to a bunch of angry indie rockers? Can’t do it.
It doesn’t help that Waters hasn’t made a great record since The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking,his first post-Floyd effort in 1984. From the evidence of the one“newish” song he played Sunday, we’re not about to get another onesoon. “Leaving Beirut” was a textbook example of how wrong overtlypolitical rock can go. Waters, in a rare address to the crowd, told ofhow he was taken in by a Lebanese family while stranded as a wanderingyouth in 1961. The tune that followed seemed to be trying to argue theposition that because some Lebanese good samaritans were nice to himone night 47 years ago, war is bad. This may indeed be the case, butI’m not sure Waters’ weirdly pedestrian song argues it veryeffectively. In case we missed the point, there were lyrical shout-outsto George W. Bush (“That Texas education must have f—ed you up whenyou were very small”), Tony Blair (“Not in my name, Tony, you great warleader you… Now we are Genghis Khan”), and America itself (“Don’t letthe might of the Christian right f— it up for you and the rest of theworld”). However well-intentioned, this was painful stuff for anadmirer of as formidable a talent as Waters’ to sit through.
So, hey, bring on Dark Side, with its Laserium-like film loops playing right to the stoners in the crowd, and the opening and closing Wallmaterial. (Did we mention that this was the first Coachella set ever tolast almost three hours and have a 20-minute intermission?) Much as Iwas chagrined to see Waters trade in pure nostalgia to pick up apaycheck, the material itself has aged well, and I even allowed myselfto hope that some of the indie crowd who’ve settled for ephemera mightlisten and get into what was once great about this stuff and have alittle ambition rub off on ‘em. But they’ll probably remember the pig.
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Mr. Willman, you’ve got it all wrong. Roger is, was, and always will be the creative genius behind all of Pink Floyd’s greatest albums. It doesn’t matter who got to sing the parts, the words were all written by Mr. Waters. The three other members who tour as “Pink Floyd” are the real tribute band, as they continue to play Water’s hits. Plus, you lost all credibility when you claimed Roger hasn’t made a “great record since the pros and cons.” Perhaps you missed it (because Waters could not release it under the Pink Floyd banner) but Amused to Death is quite possible the greatest Waters’ concept album of all time. Much more elaborate and “Floyd like” than the Division Bell, with Roger’s signature political slant and angst that is missing with the post-Waters Floyd. Water’s words continue to be relevant and attract young fans almost 40 years after they were originally written. A true legend in his own time.
Adam, I don’t doubt for a second that Water was the creative genius of Floyd, and that he deserves to be performing that material more than Gilmour, if deserve’s got anything to do with it. But why, for example, doesn’t HE sing “Money” during the Dark Side recreation? It’s not like that one is out of his range. The only possible answer is that he thinks fans expect to see a young, dark-haired lead guitarist singing that song instead of him, and so he hands it over to the Gilmour ringer, for no other good reason. If Waters sang Dark Side in its entirety (except maybe, you know. “Great Gig in the Sky”), and fussed around with the parts a little so it wasn’t so completely like listening to the original CD on the world’s greatest sound system, I’d pay good money to see that.
Pink Floyd was a band not Roger Waters solo act. Have you notice how much RW’s solo stuff sucked?
Chris, “the only possible answer” is not that “fans expect to see a young, dark-haired lead guitarist singing that song instead of him.” Rather, at 64 years old it is amazing that Roger can sing at all, let alone for 3+ hours each night. From what I’ve seen, the “only possible solution” is that part of the majesty to the Floyd sound was the dichotomy between Waters’ “dark” or even “crazy” voice and Gilmore’s polished and “clean” vocals. It is best illustrated on Comfortably Numb, which is basically a duet where Gilmore’s and Waters’ vocals complement each other and demonstrate the conflicting nature of the song. (Gilmore’s parts clean, Waters’ parts filled with angst.) And if you don’t think you got your money’s worth out of Roger’s over the top performance, I doubt any show will ever satisfy you.
FYI: There’s a $10K reward (plus free Coachella tickets for life) for the person who finds the pig:
http://www.mydesert.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200880428034
The original creative genius behind Pink Floyd is SYD BARRETT. Most of Floyd’s material after they kicked him out was based on Syd’s life. Syd paved the way for the psychaedelic Floyd music we all listened to and came to love in the 70’s. I love Pink Floyd with Syd and without Syd. They are all talented men and should not be pitted against one another. Roger Waters is great, but he is better with David, Rick and Nick. He does not stand out alone. His solo records could never compare to Pink Floyd. Although he does throw a mean concert these days. Love the Syd Barrett tribute he does. Just wanted to clear things up. And on another note, I don’t appreciate Roger coming to America and trashing my President, both current and past. Remember where you got your freedrom from Roger. You’d be speaking German right now if it wasn’t for us. So shaddup already!
Huge Floyd Fan
Roger Waters is spectacular in concert. I saw this show last year in Hartford and he had a pig and played Dark Side of The Moon cover to cover in the 2nd set and it was probably the best concert I saw last year. He’s so controling when it comes to the live shows that the often bickered about it in Floyd. waters wanted everything to be precisely tiimes out while on stage and it doesnt always woirk that way. He his a very talened artist. There last tour in 94′ was Epic. These guys should tour they’d make more than the Stones do!
Mr. Willman, I am emphatic agreement with Adam. “Amused to Death” is one of the most amazing concept albums in history and it contains all the musical genius that’s been missing from Pink Floyd since his departure. And a comment to the deluded stoner that commented on Coachella being an “Indie” event, there’s not an indie band in existence that hasn’t already rehashed an idea that was previously recorded by Roger Waters. Hell, even “Radio KAOS” was a better album than a lot of indie bands can muster. You should check them out.
Like you, Chris, Pink Floyd was an important band when I was growing up, and past. I actually thought at Live 8 in 05 and their induction into the British Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame that they’d at least buried the hatchet, but no. ‘So you think you can tell/Heaven from Hell indeed….Actually I love the idea of the Floyd’s pigs buzzing those pretentious kids and their festival!!!!
The only thing bad about this show was the fact that Chris Willman decided to go and write this lame review. Why don’t you take a good look at the lyrics of some of your favorite Floyd songs and see who wrote them. Or instead you could go back to listening to Phish, Rush, Queensryche or some other band that you somehow think is better. That or get a better day job.
Chirs, you are out of touch. If you go to the Coachella forum, you will see the Waters show is being widely touted as the greatest Coachella performance ever.
Did you have a bit too much to drink?
Thousands of fans saying they weren’t Floyd fans but are now, people calling it “the greatest Coachella performance ever”.
What show did you see?
The Roger Waters show at Coachella was the greatest concert I have ever seen hands down. I think that playing Gilmore’s licks note for note was a sign of respect, as in ‘this does not need to be improved’ the guitarists up there obviously had the chops to do whatever they wanted to; that was a personal choice not a lack of anything. One more nit: the stoners in the crowd? Dude, you weren’t tripping??? What a total waste.
I found the Pink Floyd pig in my driveway Monday morning! Evidently it had escaped from the concert at Coachella on Sunday night, and climbed a little too high. It now more resembles “pulled pork” than the pig it once was!
Only a “Critic” could be at such a momtoues event, and not get high to the greatest high muisc in the world ! ! ! ! I guess Chris does his designer drugs in the Carribean with his “rich” friends….