The Emptiness of Time and Space

When Richard Wright passed away on September 15th, a small part of my youth went along with him. I remember that teenage kid, and I have a feeling that I may not be the only one who lost a bit of that hopeful, open-minded, arrogant, wonderful, and ever-growing young person who still exists somewhere in all of us.

True, many people relegate that part of their personality to a place that is dark and inaccesible, only to manifest itself during dreams and nightmares. Others manage to maintain that fresh and optimistic outlook even during times of strife and difficulty. Not to be confused with childish immaturity, this is what keeps us from becoming old, in that figurative way that closes the mind, sours the outlook, and puts a sad end to cultural and artistic growth. It is for those folks – who can still remember that 16 year old know-it-all little prick, and don’t hate them – that I have put together this compilation. For those who embrace that time of their life, and while not necessarily longing to return there, remember it with both clarity and fondness.

For me and my friends, music was a huge part of that time, and Pink Floyd was as big as it got for us. I think we all considered ourselves quite intelligent and accomplished for “appreciating” music of such high lyrical and compositional aspiration. Something that most of our parents couldn’t even grasp. Pink Floyd was also one of the only bands we could ALL agree on. We all had our favourites, but we didn’t necessarily agree on them. Pink Floyd was THE band. The official group of our group. Floyd made up a good part of the soundtrack of those years, with every album getting played to the point of wear, but God help you if a record got scratched. I guess I just dated myself.

David Gilmour and Roger Waters may have been the collective “frontal lobe” of the band, but in my opinion, it was keyboardist Richard Wright who provided the sonic backbone. He was the one who elevated their ambitious and deep explorations to the far reaches of the cosmos, and took us there with them.

I chose these songs in particular because they are among my personal favourites, but also because I think that they showcase Richard’s considerable contributions to the band. I know that everyone will be able to recognize a couple of glaring omissions, because there are. Even I feel that a few integral tracks are missing, most notably, Echoes and Welcome to the Machine, but I was determined to maintain a one CD length, so I apologize to those who may feel that I’ve left something out.

Enjoy this compilation, as I enjoyed putting it together, even under the sad circumstances. It brought me back, made me think, and made me smile. Take a trip through The Emptiness of Time and Space, and may that 16 year old inside of you never die.

Richard Wright RIP.

Here’s what David Gilmour had to say about his pal Rick on Monday 15 September 2008:

“No one can replace Richard Wright. He was my musical partner and my friend. In the welter of arguments about who or what was Pink Floyd, Rick’s enormous input was frequently forgotten. He was gentle, unassuming and private but his soulful voice and playing were vital, magical components of our most recognised Pink Floyd sound. I have never played with anyone quite like him. The blend of his and my voices and our musical telepathy reached their first major flowering in 1971 on ‘Echoes’. In my view all the greatest PF moments are the ones where he is in full flow. After all, without ‘Us and Them’ and ‘The Great Gig In The Sky’, both of which he wrote, what would ‘The Dark Side Of The Moon’ have been? Without his quiet touch the Album ‘Wish You Were Here’ would not quite have worked. In our middle years, for many reasons he lost his way for a while, but in the early Nineties, with ‘The Division Bell’, his vitality, spark and humour returned to him and then the audience reaction to his appearances on my tour in 2006 was hugely uplifting and it’s a mark of his modesty that those standing ovations came as a huge surprise to him, (though not to the rest of us). Like Rick, I don’t find it easy to express my feelings in words, but I loved him and will miss him enormously.”

Roger Waters’ statement:

“I was very sad to hear of Rick’s premature death, I knew he had been ill, but the end came suddenly and shockingly. My thoughts are with his family, particularly [his children] Jamie and Gala and their mum Juliet, who I knew very well in the old days, and always liked very much and greatly admired. As for the man and his work, it is hard to overstate the importance of his musical voice in the Pink Floyd of the ’60s and ’70s. The intriguing, jazz influenced, modulations and voicings so familiar in ‘Us and Them’ and ‘Great Gig in the Sky,’ which lent those compositions both their extraordinary humanity and their majesty, are omnipresent in all the collaborative work the four of us did in those times. Rick’s ear for harmonic progression was our bedrock. I am very grateful for the opportunity that Live 8 afforded me to engage with him and David [Gilmour] and Nick [Mason] that one last time. I wish there had been more.”

Nick Mason told Entertainment Weekly:

“Like any band, you can never quite quantify who does what. But Pink Floyd wouldn’t have been Pink Floyd if [we] hadn’t had Rick. I think there’s a feeling now — particularly after all the warfare that went on with Roger and David trying to make clear what their contribution was — that perhaps Rick rather got pushed into the background. Because the sound of Pink Floyd is more than the guitar, bass, and drum thing. Rick was the sound that knitted it all together… He was by far the quietest of the band, right from day one. And, I think, probably harder to get to know than the rest of us… It’s almost that George Harrison thing. You sort of forget that they did a lot more than perhaps they’re given credit for.”

Take a trip “Up the Khyber” with Rick and Pink Floyd:

Track Listing:

1) Astronomy Domine
2) One of These Days
3) Time
4) See Emily Play
5) Corporal Clegg
6) Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk
7) Up the Khyber
8) Sheep
9) Main Theme from More
10) Lucifer Sam
11) Let There Be More Light
12) Ibiza Bar
13) Pigs (three different ones)
14) Arnold Layne
15) Remember a Day
16) The Nile Song