Roger Waters Talks New ‘Wall’ Film, Pink Floyd Tour With Hendrix
When Roger Waters was watching an in-progress cut of his new concert film, Roger Waters The Wall, he realized something in it was missing. Throughout the production, images of people whose lives have been irrevocably changed by war — those who are missing loved ones, those who died while fighting — flash on a giant wall constructed around the band, as it plays Pink Floyd‘s landmark 1979 double album.
“I was attaching to all of the people’s fallen loved ones whose pictures we showed on the wall,” he says. The 72-year-old singer-songwriter, dressed casually in a black T, jeans and unlaced shoes, is reclining on a couch in a suite high atop the Sony building in Manhattan. “I realized that there was a bit of my narrative that was sort of missing. So I came up with the idea of making a road trip to my grandfather’s grave and to the memorial to my father. Plus, it will give me an excuse to buy an old Bentley.” He smiles widely and warmly.
With the addition of Waters’ road trip, which takes some surrealistic turns between numbers from The Wall, the film became something more than a typical concert film. While it majestically presents the singer’s stunning production of The Wall, which he performed 219 times between 2010 and 2013, it also conveys the absurdity of war and the loss it has indelibly left on Waters, who breaks down when reading the letter his mother received informing her of his father’s death in World War II in a scene between songs. But when coupled with the concert footage, Roger Waters The Wall is at once moving and hopeful.
“We decided to interweave this narrative as a bit of relief instead of just, ‘Let’s sit here and watch a rock concert in a cinema,’ which always seemed like a bit of a stretch,” Waters says. “I think that the road-movies sequences illuminate the political and humanitarian philosophy behind the whole thing.”
In anticipation of the widespread theatrical release of Roger Waters The Wall, which will screen in cinemas around the world on September 29th, the singer-songwriter met with Rolling Stone for an in-depth interview to discuss what The Wall means to him now as well as his plans for the future.
Has what The Wall means to you changed over the years?
No, not really. The context changes but the story remains the same. If people see this movie, what I hope is that that they may look at one another and go, “You know what? We are a community, and we are many. There are a lot of us.”
The non-concert portions of the film seem very personal to you. It records the first time you visited the beach in Anzio, Italy, where your father died. How is it that this was the first time?
I’ve never tried to visit, because my father’s body was never found. I never really knew the circumstances of his death in any detail.
How did you learn what happened?
We’d been in southern Italy, filming in the memorial garden at Cassino — a lot of people gathered, including a news crew. And some old bloke, a British expat named Harry Shindler living in Italy, saw it on his TV. He went, “I might be able to help that person.” He traces people from the Second World War who are missing and tries to fill in the gaps. He called me and I went, “Well, that’s nice.” Bugger me, if he didn’t find, within the size of this room, he found the spot where he was actually killed.