Pink Floyd News/ Rick Wright Tribute:
I really hoped I
wouldn’t have to do this until the website was aeons into its web-life, but
here we are with the site not properly up and running and already one of the
leading lights responsible for inspiring it has gone. The sad and unexpected
death of Rick Wright, co-founder, keyboardist ,vocalist and songwriter with
Pink Floyd, comes as a great shock to us all because it was only two years ago
Rick seemed in the best of health and enjoying a higher profile than he had had
in years, stepping into the limelight for the first time in over a decade by
becoming an integral part of fellow Floyd David Gilmour’s touring band and
making more TV/stage/music appearances than any time since the hey-deys of the
Floyd in the early 70s. On the one hand I’m suprised at the amount of fuss
currently being shown by Rick’s death in national newspapers and television
news broadcasts, given that Pink Floyd have performed a grand total of once in
the past 14 years and Rick was the band member with the lowest profile of all,
despite serving long enough with the group to play on 13 out of their 14
albums. But on the other hand, I’m actually not that surprised at all, as to
those who have always followed the Floyd, Rick’s role within the band was a
special one, despite the louder more boisterous voices within the group. First
line-up leading light Syd Barrett might have taken the band into whimsical
hob-goblin land, Roger Waters might have infused the band with its political
power and more recently David Gilmour brought the band a largely unique hybrid
of noisy rock and pastoral folk. But it was Rick’s spooky melancholy that oozed
from the Floyd at all times in its troubled history, with his easily identifiable
shimmering keyboard licks and occasional compositions giving the band many of
the greatest highlights of their back catalogue. Indeed, how such a talented
musician as Rick ever got into the position of playing second-fiddle to a
fellow band member who actually joined the band several recordings after he did
is all part of Pink Floyd’s confusing story, one full of ridiculous twists and
turns even compared to the other artists on this list.
Born Richard
William Wright on July 28th 1943 in Middlesex, Rick is one of the few musicians
on this list to show an interest in
music since he could walk. Rick learnt guitar, trumpet and trombone during his
schooling (you can hear him play the latter for the only time on record during
the Floyd’s ’Biding My Time’, an originally unreleased oddity on the ’Relics’
compilation of 1973), but it is the piano which Rick came to be most well known
for. Classical training and a life-long love of jazz later gave the Floyd
several extra avenues for developing their sound and Rick seemed at one point
to be primed for life as a musician in a more—shall we say—respected field of
music. Somehow (’by mistake’ according to Rick’s later account) the musician
wound up taking a u-turn and started studying architecture at Regent Street Polytechnic
where he met fellow Floyds Roger Waters and Nick Mason. After realizing their
common interests and—according to Nick Mason’s later autobiog Inside Out—losing
all interest in anything architecture had to offer) the three men plus various
local friends and associates appearing locally under a wide assortment of
ludicrous names (most famously the ’architectural abdabs’). The band truly
became serious about their pursuit of music when band friend and fellow Cambridge
The Floyd story
should have taken on a very different path at this point, but a combination of
Syd’s fear of stardom, bad experiences with drugs and boredom with repeating
himself meant that the state of Pink Floyd’s leader put them in a very
precarious position indeed. Thinking the unthinkable, they drafted in band and
especially Barrett friend David Gilmour to cover for him and promptly broke
away from their former leader, despite the fact that there had only been one
non-Barrett recorded under the groups’ name up until that point. Rick was the
obvious replace for Barrett, having handled several sterling vocals on the
band’s earliest recordings and his own first batch of songs—Paintbox and
Remember A Day especially —were promising material. But then came bassist Roger
Waters, stepping up to the mark with the power and determination that Barrett
had once had and - luckily for the band - out of nowhere, Waters arrived with
the vision and the songs to match. In any other group, Rick would have been in
the perfect position to become band leader and household name—but all the
Floyds (except Roger, perhaps) seem to have been reluctant to have ever stepped
into the limelight and Rick seemed to falter more and more over his position
with his band in the years ahead. And yet, even while being sidelined, Rick
continued to shine when given even half a chance. Many of the highlights of the next batch of
Floyd records are down to Rick; ’Remember A Day’ is a classic song,
Barrett-like in its mixture of childlike call towards a more innocent past and
the dark and foreboding future that seems to hang heavy over the narrator; the sweet
brass-filled pop of ‘Summer ‘68’ which comes complete with one of the catchiest
riffs in the Floyd’s back catalogue; the delightful organ-led ballad ‘Burning
Bridges’; the typically muted and reluctant cry for help ’Stay’ with its
memorable hook-line and chorus; even the much-maligned singles ’Paintbox’ and
’It Would Be So Nice’ are lovely songs, half full of gloriously mournful and
heartfelt cynicism and half full of delightful tongue-in-cheekness, as if Rick
is laughing at himself for even trying to write the ‘serious’ songs that Roger
Waters was now making his own.
Everything
changed when ’Dark Side Of The Moon’ came out in 1973, turning the Floyds from
a much-loved and fairly famous underground band into the most talked about
group on the planet. Arguably one of the reasons ’Moon’ sold so well compared
to past Floyd records is that at last, after several false starts post
Barrett’s departure, the Floyd sound united as a group, with all four members
on top form and pitching ideas in. Along with the short side-project committed
to tape just three months before Dark Side sessions started—the film soundtrack
’Obscured By Clouds’, where Rick enjoyed two co-writes and several group
credits - Rick was enjoying a second spurt of creativity. This was perhaps, in
part, because Roger Waters had finally come up with a ‘grand’ concept that Rick
could relate to. ‘Dark Side’ appeals to as many listeners as it does because it
studies in turn the fears and pressures that each individual in the modern
world is meant to have fought against at some point. Rick always sounded
slightly uncomfortable with his own heavier material before this point,
something which is understandable given the icy looks the other Floyds were
well known for giving each other when presenting new material. However, its
noticeable that now Rick was being actively encouraged to work in a serious
project he came up with perhaps two of the most serious songs on the album, ’Us
and Them’ and ’Great Gig In The Sky’, as well as several three-way and four-way
writing credits. ‘Us and Them’ is a track that most reflects the Floyd sound
for many people, with its luscious spaces between its long-drawn out notes and
lovely lilting piano riff, a sound enhanced by Roger Waters’ perfectly fitting
lyrics about isolation, separation and division. Recycling a piece of music
recently submitted to but rejected from the Antonioni film ‘Zabriskie Point’,
this piece of music somehow manages to be comfortingly warm and chillingly cold
all at the same time and is testament to Rick’s hidden talent within the band.
’Great Gig’ got even more spines tingling and will now be very hard for all us
fans to hear, as it’s one long cathartic wail (provided by session singer Clare
Torry) and spoken word reflections about death combined to make one of the most
talked about pieces on the record, ending the first side of the album in
haunting style. Ironically, this piece of music was dubbed ’religion’ in its
early stages before Rick worked out exactly what he wanted to do with
it—fittingly, this instrumental is the most spiritual piece of Floyd music
around.
Rick’s piano and
keyboard work was to the fore in both this album and follow-up ’Wish You Were
Here’ (1975), a record often cited as Rick’s favourite record with the band.
Despite only possessing five tracks (and one of them is a ’continuation’ of an
earlier track) and despite being recorded in between some of the biggest
arguments to have been contained within a recording studio, the Floyd
inter-band skills were never better. Rick’s solo icy keyboard parts at the
beginning of the first and end of the second parts of ’Shine On You Crazy
Diamond’, a track written in tribute to former partner Syd Barrett, are the
perfect scene-setter and goodbye to the record respectively. Offering an aural
warmth unusual for synthesizers of the period, Rick’s sound on the record is
the epitome of reluctant detachment, cleverly reflecting the themes of
isolation and not-quite-being-there that the record title and cover pictures
depicted with just enough warmth to make you feel that the narrator is detached
against his better judgement. Thereafter Rick got silenced within the group
once more, as Roger Waters continued to strengthen his claim to ‘his’ group and
David Gilmour, as ever, did his best to prove Roger wrong. Rick survived the
making of ’Animals’ (1977) by the skin of his teeth, but by the recording of
The Wall in 1979/80 (see review no 76 for more) he began to clash too many
times with character opposite Roger Waters over just about everything—his ideas,
his share of Roger’s commitment and vision and his lack of songs—and found
himself pushed out of the band he had co-founded, given an ultimatum to leave
quietly or Roger would scrap the band’s entire 80-minute magnum opus at a time
when the band were on the verge of being bankrupt.
Perhaps if Rick
had saved back some songs from his forgotten first solo album ’Wet Dream’
(1978) then Roger might have been kinder about his perceived lack of input.
Floyd solo albums to date are a mixed bag, with each member in turn sorely
lacking the strength or musicianship that the others bring when they work
together, but outside perhaps of Roger’s ‘Amused To Death’, this album works
well on its own merits and is one of the best Floyd solos as a whole. Most
commentators, when they notice this obscure album at all, call it a timid
affair which seems deliberately recorded to avoid catching the ear or looking
one in the eye. Actually, delve further and it’s a very brave record; Rick’s
slight vocals seem deliberately lowly mixed so that you can’t hear the vocals
too clearly—but given Rick’s state of mind in 1978 (fractured band; fractured
marriage) the lyrics are impressively courageous and revealing (at one stage he
even sings a ‘goodbye lyric’ written by his troubled wife, something even Roger
Waters would think twice about delivering). Rick’s languid piano accompanying
is also rarely better than during the real ’songs’ on this record and takes on
quite a different form on the ‘instrumentals’; driving rockers accompanied by
lilting saxophones that give Booker T and the MGs a run for their money. Certainly compared to its close cousin ’David
Gilmour’, another solo record released in the same month, it sounds very
co-ordinated and, occasionally, surprisingly edgy given its reputation as a bit
of a non-starter.
While back in
Pink Floyd Roger continued to bicker and Dave began to disagree with him just
for the hell of it, Rick broke as far away from the Floyd’s traditional sound
as he possibly could with the album ‘Identity’ (1984), released in
collaboration with comparative youngster Dave Harris under the moniker ‘Zee’.
This album too died a death and is one of the hardest Floyd-related records to
track down, with the general census being that while this album was commendably
modern for its day, its use of 1980s synthesizers and impressively early but
depressingly primitive digital sampling means it hasn’t fared quite as well as
‘Wet Dream’. After this, Rick went into semi-retirement on board a yacht he
bought with his last Floyd earnings and kept until his death before
unexpectedly being called back into the Pink Floyd family once again. Roger had
finally delivered to his colleagues what he felt was the biggest trump card he
could possibly play, declaring the band ‘over’ as an entity and explaining to
the press and anyone who would listen that as the last few band records were
effectively ‘his’ solo records, the group’s fans should follow him from then
on. Dave Gilmour followed a career-long trend by disagreeing with Roger in the
most public way and announced that a ’new’ Floyd would be formed, welcoming
Rick back into the fold—although so dodgy was the faith of the band’s
management and record company and so destructive had the band’s past management
and company difficulties been that Rick only re-joined the band on a wage,
rather than as a fully paid-up member. His confidence reportedly still in
tatters after Roger’s best efforts to attack it, Rick - like fellow Floyd Nick
Mason - reportedly had only a minimal amount of input into Floyd comeback
record ’A Momentary Lapse Of reason’ (1987). Yet even if the keyboard parts
weren’t all played by Rick like we were lead to believe, its interesting that,
given the instruction to produce a ‘Pink Floyd-like record’, the hodge-podge of
band members, friends and session musos go out of their way on this record to
re-create Rick’s characteristic keyboard ‘sound’, rather than Waters’ political
rants or Gilmour’s more velvety vocals/power guitar riffs which might have been
a more obvious way to go.
Follow-up record
Division Bell (1994) finally gave fans something closer to what they wanted to
hear—the band no longer tried to replace Roger by shouting like him but worked
to the strengths provided by the three of them instead. The record may well be
Gilmour’s finest hour—most of the songs are his and his expressive guitar
playing and vocals are rarely better. Yet it was Rick’s sudden returning
confidence that gave the record much of its ’soul’; the sound is dominated by
his atmospheric keyboards (most definitely played by Rick this time around) and
Rick’s contemporary-sounding update of his old sound hit the spot for much of
the record. Best of all, Rick’s supporting vocals and rare single lead vocal
were impressive indeed, turning back the clock to 27 years before by giving
Rick back his favourite ’sympathetic foil/second-in-command’ role. Indeed,
Rick’s co-write ‘Wearing The Inside Out’ was heralded by virtually everybody
(including me) as the record’s clear highlight, with Gilmour and Wright trading
contrasting verses just like the days of old, while Rick’s dazed but courageous
vocal did much to bring out the subtleties in the song’s lyrics. The Floyd
cognoscenti, knowing how long it took the band to put new records out even in
their heyday, thought that that would be it for a while—and then Rick surprised
us all by releasing his third solo effort ’Broken China’ in 1996. Well received
by most critics, but surprisingly poor-selling even when tagged onto the tail
end of the ‘Division Bell’ juggernaut, Broken China follows on from ’Wearing
The Inside Out’ by dampening much of the Floyd’s traditional ’heavy’ sound in
favour of a light ’new age’ ambience. Like Rick’s other solo albums, ’China’
doesn’t actually have that many ’songs’ on it (much of it is made up of
instrumentals), but the overall theme of depression and isolation is a very
Floydian one and closing song ’Break Through’ has become something of a fan
favourite, despite this record’s low profile.
All went quiet
again on the Wright front until Rick suddenly emerged, unheralded, behind David
Gilmour’s left shoulder when the guitar legend started touring again in 2005 in
support of his new solo album ‘On An Island’. In truth, ‘Island ’
has Rick’s colourful fingerprints all over it and is less of a solo record than
‘Momentary Reason’ had been. Indeed, any other artist would have demanded
co-billing for their hard labour and pulling power, but Rick seemed at his
happiest as a fully paid up member of Gilmour’s crew, without the hassles and
problems of running the show, and his excellent turns in the spotlight on
’Arnold Layne’ ’Comfortably Numb’ ‘Wearing The Inside Out’ and his own
’Breakthrough’ on the two live David Gilmour DVD sets currently out are among
both concert’s highlights (there’s a third one, ‘Live At Gdansk’, out any day
now). Certainly, Rick seemed more comfortable working with Gilmour alone than
when all three Floyds joined again with Roger Waters for Live 8 in 2005.
Typically Floyd, Gilmour nonchalantly stole all the camera angles because
that’s who the director obviously thought was the star, despite the best
efforts of Roger Waters to politely try and steal the show and direct the
camera back to him. Little noticed for most of the concert, Rick stuck his head
down and let Floyd’s two boisterous buddies get on with their job posing for
the cameras while he—perhaps more than any other member the band’s most
dedicated musician— ignored the cameras and got on with his job of making
music. Rick might not be the name or the face people think of when they picture
the Floyd, but for those of us who know the band’s music well, it is Rick’s
sound that we conjure up in our ears when we think of their music. The sonar
‘pings’ on Echoes, the killer keyboard runs on ‘Any Colour You Like’ and those
glorious harmonies on ‘Arnold Layne’ and ‘See Emily Play’ are among the most
treasured moments in the band’ back catalogue and they are all down to Rick’s
distinctive style and talents. The great gig in the sky seems to get louder and
busier every year now, with more 60s and 70s legends passing there all the
time. This week it gained one of its greatest stars, even though Rick himself
would never ever see it that way. Shine on, the Floyd’s other crazy
diamond.
Top
5 Rick Wright moments:
5)
‘Against The Odds’ (Rick Wright/ Wet Dream, 1978):
Twenty
years before Lulu had a hit with the same sentiments, Rick braved his feelings
to the world and declared ‘I don’t want to fight no more’; exactly the sort of
statement that was getting the assertive Roger Waters so worked up during the
’Animals’ sessions the year before this song came out. But Rick is right here
and obviously has these very thoughts much on his mind—this is his first
released lyric on a record since 1969 after all and they’re genuinely moving.
The arrangement is clever too; the verses to this song are isolation
personified, with only a sparse piano lick a la ’Us and Them’ for company. But
the choruses come in from nowhere to give this mournful song a happy twist,
suddenly modulating itself to the major key and suggesting that, despite all
the odds, everything might be OK. Suddenly everything on the track is in
perfect harmony and this understated melancholic song ultimately delivers far
more emotion than half an hour of Roger Waters screaming (although, to be fair,
that sound is surprisingly moving as well).
4)
‘The Great Gig In The Sky’ (Pink Floyd/ Dark Side Of The Moon, 1973):
Talking
of moving, this ode to death sounded like nothing else that had ever been
released back in 1973—and it still doesn’t sound like anything ever released to
this day. Rick’s tight-fitting gospelly piano chords invoke a truly sublime
response from session singer Clare Torry, who improvised her way around the
piece as if hypnotized by Rick’s ear-catching melancholic hookline. Both
Clare’s vocal and the spoken-word additions (like the rest of ’Dark Side’, this
track is littered with extracts from interviews with band friends and
associates; in this case responding to the question ’are you frightened of
dying?’) are superlative, but its Rick’s thoughtful piano structure that gives
this track it’s intoxicating mood.
3)
‘Remember A Day’ (Pink Floyd/ A Saucerful Of Secrets, 1968):
More
Syd Barrett-like than anything Syd ever actually wrote, this is a classic early
Floyd song, recorded during the ‘Piper’ sessions but left unreleased till the
follow-up album. The twinkling piano riff, fluffy treated vocals and gorgeously
cheery lyrics about summer times from childhood are set against a truly
mournful middle-eight, a space age vocal sound effects battle between Syd and
Rick and some of the most chilling sound effects ever placed on record, all
making up a track that is one of the Floyd’s most unfairly neglected gems.
2)
‘Us And Them’ (Pink Floyd/ Dark Side Of The Moon, 1973):
When
film director Antonioni asked the Floyd to come up with some music for his film
‘Zabriskie Point’, the group jumped at the change to highlight one of the most
shocking and memorable scenes in the film—the one where a load of rioting students
get unsparingly beaten up by the police. Most groups would have done the
obvious—pretended they were Metallica re-incarnated hanging from their feet and
screaming whilst dangling from a rollercoaster. Not so the Floyd. Rick went
quite the other way and brought to the table a piece of music so sparse and
mournful that it’s sense of fragility and the preciousness of each note somehow
made even more sense when set against the mindless violence in the film.
Rejected and then recycled for ‘Dark Side’, Roger Waters put his smoldering
differences with Rick aside to come up with the perfect accompanying set of
lyrics, dealing with isolation and mankind’s need to put his fellow man into
‘categories’, juxtaposing verses of icy placidness with a froth of fiery indignation
on the chorus. A typically brilliant Floyd lesson in contrasts.
1)
‘Wearing The Inside Out’ (Pink Floyd/ Division Bell, 1994):
The
most unexpected Floyd treat of all. When the group announced they were
releasing a new album in 1994, we never dared hope that they’d reach heights
like this. Rick’s first lead vocal for the band since ‘Dark Side’ 21 years
before, this complex song about courage mixed in atmospheric keyboards, a
mournful saxophone riff, a classy David Gilmour guitar solo and some sterling
Floydian lyrics about fighting back after years of withdrawal from band friend
Anthony Moore. This wasn’t Rick’s statement about coming back to life then
(Rick gets a credit for the music, not the lyrics), but it just reads like it
should be and hearing Rick’s vulnerable but battling tonsils getting round the
words is very moving. Not many Pink Floyd songs make you cry (they weren’t that
kind of band), but for some reason this one always does. Magic stuff.
♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫♫
No comments:
Post a Comment