STILL WATERS RUN DEEP

I think that should read “still Waters ruin deep.” I refer to Roger Waters, musician known for his participation in the band Pink Floyd. Now he’s on a solo tour and I saw his concert broadcast live to my local cinema. Amazingly really as I have followed the Floyd and associated solo musicians for over fifty years and now to experience the music and atmosphere of a live concert ten minutes’ walk from my home is quite honestly plain weird. Then again, the whole music scene of the early Floyd was just weird so I shouldn’t be surprised. Adding to this feeling was my observation before the screen as I sat in the bar watching and guessing who was turning up for the Waters gig and who was racing in for the latest Disney special. Boy oh boy was I surprised when a little old lady popped in on her own and head banged all the way through the concert. As she left the cinema, she shouted out to the staff that next time they better show “The Wall”! Obviously, a die hard.

Is there a link to glass? Well kind of if you count me making words out of glass rod which reads 2Pink” and “Floyd”. I used to make many different versions and what’s more used to sell them. There was a magazine, a fanzine I believe they call it which was called “The Amazing pudding.” Seems an innocent title and was a nickname or working title for one of the early pink Floyd albums titled “Atom Heart Mother.” It was this album that got me into the band. I advertised my glass names in the mag and used photos of the words to promote the subject. My photographer at the time decided to use a pink filter and the result looks like I used pink glass which I thought great. Unfortunately, the customers that bought my glass based on the appearance of the product in the photograph were gutted and I didn’t sell many after the storm blew over.

My connection with glass and Pink Floyd does extend further than that, however. I have made a couple of logos for David Gilmour who used to play lead guitar with the Floyd. Is ay “used” to but he still does, its just that the Floyd don’t play very often. Mr Waters left in the 1980s and thought that was the end of the band but alas 9for him) the band goes on. It’s a sober thought that no one is indispensable!

For David Gilmour live at the Royal Albert Hall DVD I made a glass outline of a figure of a man playing a guitar. It was originally a wire sculpture and I developed it into a glass figure. A photograph of it was feature on the DVD cover. A variation of this was a guitar playing a man and I made this for the Society of Caithness Artists annual exhibition. Sold it on first night so there is someone out there that thinks like me. Poor them!!

In 2006 I was privileged to be invited backstage at the Glasgow Armadillo to meet David Gilmour and his crew which included his wife. OK, OK so Mr Gilmour never turned up, but others did. I guess DG decided it was too much of a competition for two world renown artists to be on the same stage at the same time. His lost me thinks!

I have made a few glass walls and like the idea and concept of the wall being something to hide behind and also that it offers a level of protection. However, a clear glass wall may defeat the purpose as all can see through the wall to the other side. But the surrealistic in me tells me that one has to break through a wall to see through a wall as one can’t see though clear glass even if it looks possible. It will offer a distorted image, one which the viewer will have difficulty in trusting. A bit like seeing life through rose coloured spectacles. Heaven forbids that happens to me as I really would be making a spectacle of myself!

A day after the Roger Waters concert I hear he was in trouble by wearing a military uniform in Berlin at a concert where it was accused that he was inciting violence. Absolutely rubbish and highlights the media can make or break lives. I first saw Pink Floyd perform The Wall at Earls Court in London in 1980 and similar uniforms were being worn by all members. Its all in the name of art my dear!!!!!!