Roger Waters - The Wall @ Manchester Arena, 16 Sept 2013

We descended on the Phones 4 U Arena (as it is currently called) in Hunts Bank, North Manchester on a soaking wet Monday night. The lines of people snaked along every road adjacent to the venue and the touts were out offering to buy and sell tickets with 30 mins to go before 'kick off'. Clearly there was a major event about to take place and I was pondering the fact that It is not often that one gets to see a body of work which one has grown up with being performed and interpreted by the author. Therefore, I was really looking forward to the show. On 30 November the album will be 34 years old, older than many I saw queuing up to get in!

The arena holds 23,000 and was full on the night with the exception of an area high up at the back of the venue which was curtained off. This was presumably due to the fact that the light show was housed below this bank of seating. As the place filled up we were treated to various world music songs over the arena's sound system and at one point during a gap between songs a wag shouted out "You. Yes you. Stand still laddie"! It would be fair to say that the band would be playing to an appreciative audience!

The show begins.....

And so at about 20:30 the show began with a flash of light, a burst of colour and a crescendo of sound. From the outset it was clear that this was going to be 'theatre' as much as a musical concert in the traditional sense. Indeed at times in the second half it was like being in a iMax theatre! From the start there were 'soldiers' with flags held aloft rising to the heavens above the band who were dwarfed behind the half erected wall of the title.

The sound quality was impressive which in large venues is not often the case. The location of the speakers meant that we were often assailed by sounds behind us as well as to our left and right. Indeed, a remarkable aural experience was about to unfold! 

Meanwhile on stage the wall slowly rose and the light show began to get into its swing. It is such a simple idea but so very effective. A real explosion of sound and vision, a true double whammy, married together by some of Pink Floyd's greatest songs.

 

The Wall is a rock opera that centres on Pink, a character Waters modelled after himself, with some aspects based on the band's original leader, Syd Barrett. Pink's life experiences begin with the loss of his father during WWII (Syd lost his father in the war), and continue with ridicule, abuse and torment from his schoolteachers, an overprotective mother and finally, the breakdown of his marriage. These factors all contribute to his eventual self-imposed isolation from society, represented by a metaphorical wall. The abusive teacher took on a life of his own when Another Brick in the Wall was released as a single and provided the band's only number-one hit (the last No 1 of the 1970s) in the United Kingdom, the United States, West Germany and several other countries.

These puppet characters suddenly came to life and became a bit of a perspective altering feature. One moment we were concentrating on 'Pink' (in the form of Roger Waters) as a small, diminutive figure on stage and the next we were taking in these giant apparitions, five times life size! After a fine rendition of Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2) Mr Waters thanked the kids for their singing and advised us that each show has local children up on stage to sing the chorus. How thrilled would these youngsters have been to have been part of this particular show? Meanwhile the wall got ever higher and blocked out the band block by block.

The idea for The Wall came to Waters on Pink Floyd's '77 In The Flesh tour which was their first playing large stadiums. On the final date in July in Montreal a small group of noisy fans near the stage irritated Waters so much that he spat at them (that might sound 'odd' today but back in 1977 the Punk movement was well under way and spitting was seen in a different light). He was not the only band member who felt disaffected by the show, Dave Gilmour refused to perform the usual encores. Later that night Waters spoke about his feelings of alienation and he expressed his desire to isolate himself perhaps by building a wall across the stage to separate the performers from the audience, and so The Wall was born! 

The Wall explores the ideas of abandonment and isolation, Pink is oppressed by his overprotective mother and tormented at school. Each of these traumatic episodes become "bricks in the wall". Pink eventually becomes a rock star, his relationships marred by infidelity, outbursts of violence and drug use. He finishes building his wall just as his marriage crumbles, completing his isolation from human contact.

During this part of the show, several well know logos were projected on to the backdrop, including Mercedes Benz, McDonalds, the Dollar sign, the Star of David, Crucifixes, Shell and the Hammer & Sickle. It seemed that no one was to be spared blame for the 'ugliness' being portrayed on the Wall. These 'culprits' were seen later emblazoned on a giant inflatable pig as it hovered menacingly above the crowd! It all seemed a little scatological and a bit 'off beam' but can one blame Mr Waters for having a dig at these corporate giants? 

In the show, Part One came to an end as the band, now invisible behind the wall, left the stage. During the break it acted as a backdrop for people recently killed in war or by acts of terrorism. Again we were treated to some interesting World Music and one of the tunes played was Amazing Grace by the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards. It seemed particularly fitting.

Part Two began, as side three of the original vinyl album does, with Hey You and the whole song was played out by the band, invisible behind the wall, which by now was 'blank' but soon was being used to great effect again. 

During the song Is There Anybody Out There? a large pair of eyes stared out at the crowd as several blue arc lights swept around the hall picking out patches of the audience. This all made for a thoroughly engaging show and added to the visual impact. 

Comfortably Numb (which came about when Waters was injected with a muscle relaxant to combat the effects of hepatitis during the In the Flesh Tour) is one of the outstanding songs on the album and the live rendition was magnificent. The guitar solo by Dave Kilminster was outstanding, although sadly, given the distance we were from the stage, we were unable to enjoy watching him play. 

Hidden behind his wall, (although the band were now on stage in front of the wall!), Pink's crisis escalates, culminating in a hallucinatory on-stage performance where he believes that he is a fascist dictator performing at concerts similar to Neo-Nazi rallies. And so Roger Waters donned his fascist coat, gloves and shades and with a megaphone and machine gun he spouted his warped vision of the world. It was an unsettling experience and gave a hint at how powerful men of history have been able to manipulate the masses to their way of thinking. 

Pink then sets his men on fans he considers unworthy and in 2013 some of the original words may sound uncomfortable to many but I was glad that we haven't yet reached the stage of censoring lyrics to appease the easily offended. By this stage in the proceedings, whilst I was in no way offended, I was beginning to feel quite uneasy. Like many my age (born in the 50s as The Police once sang!) I had grown up with the music and my own mental images of what it all meant. However, here we were witnessing what the author had in mind when he wrote it all those years ago.

Incidentally, at 70 years of age George Roger Waters looked in rugged rude health and his singing and bass playing were extremely good. I would also like to mention the band and singers all of whom were exceptional and they really brought the whole show alive on the night. Credit to them that they made it all sound so fresh and vibrant given they have been touring the show since September 2010!

So back to the show! By now, tormented with guilt, Pink places himself on trial, his inner judge ordering him to "tear down the wall", opening Pink to the outside world. It was during this section of the show that I felt I had wondered into the local iMax cinema as much of what was projected on the backdrop was from the 1982 film. However, this is no criticism as seeing Gerald Scarfe's wonderfully warped, writhing, wriggling characters on such a scale was thrilling, another mind expanding experience! 

As the show drew to a close the wall collapsed and the band assembled on stage again to sing the final song Outside The Wall using the tune to the introduction of the first song of the night In The Flesh? thus bringing the show full circle. The song was a great, soothing counterpoint to the tumultuous and tormenting finale to the 'wall' and contains the line:

"After all, it's not easy banging your heart against some mad bugger's wall"

which summed up the night for me. At times I felt it wasn't easy but I was sure as hell glad that I had banged my heart against this particular "mad bugger's wall".

The following musicians have played on the tour:

Roger Waters – bass, lead vocals, acoustic guitar, trumpet on "Outside the Wall"
Graham Broad – drums, percussion, ukelele on "Outside the Wall"
Jon Carin – keyboards, guitars, lap steel guitar, programming, acoustic guitar on "Outside The Wall".
Dave Kilminster – guitars, banjo on "Outside the Wall", bass on "Mother"
Snowy White – guitars, bass on "Goodbye Blue Sky"

Harry Waters – Hammond organ, keyboards, accordion on "Outside the Wall"

G. E. Smith – guitars, bass, mandolin on "Outside the Wall"

Robbie Wyckoff – lead vocals (songs or parts of songs originally sung by David Gilmour)

Jon Joyce – backing vocals

Kipp Lennon – backing vocals

Mark Lennon – backing vocals

Pat Lennon – backing vocals

David Gilmour – guest guitarist and singer at Waters' London O2 show, 12 May 2011, pre-recorded harmony vocals on "Is there anybody Out There" line.

Nick Mason – guest percussion at Waters' London O2 show, 12 May 2011.

Check out other photos taken at the show.....

As a foot note, the show started on 15 September 2010 and finished on 21 September 2013 and by 21 July 2012 some 3,299,740 tickets had been sold (representing 98% of those available) and had made a gross revenue of $377,368,148 / £248,129,746! As I said at the start - a major event, indeed some might say, a phenomenon!