Dark Side of the Moon, like a shark's fin through the waves, cut deep into the heart of teen-age existential psyche. It was tough, sonically sophisticated, and officially ended any of the Flower Power illusions that were still left over form the Sixties; the hippie revolution was over and its sunshiny idealism had rotted into paranoia. Ironically, more than almost any other band, Roger Waters and Pink Floyd represented those drug induced hazy days, but when their lead singer/songwriter Syd Barrett left for more bizarre pastures and never returned, the reality and the charred underbelly of those times hit like a heavy blunt ax. Astonishingly, Dark Side... a puzzling Kafkaesque exercise in uncertainty and madness released in 1974, went on to become one of music history's oddest and biggest success stories. In 1984, the album celebrated its 10th anniversary/520th week on the Billboard charts, breaking the worlds record and three years later, in the Summer of '87, it is still on the charts.
Guided by Waters' vision, Pink Floyd's appearances became more and more theatrical, lavish and haunted. Pictures of the moon were projected on circular screens at London's Rainbow Theater; two camouflaged spitfires were Synchronized to fly over the stage during another concert; an inflatable pig representing monetarism's worst logical conclusion soared over the audience at the premiere of the Animals concert in 1977. and, of course, a barrier of ersatz brick wall representing isolation, alienation and the howling loneliness of the human condition was built across the stage during the concert performances of The Wall in 1980.
Waters solo career began the following year with the release of The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking, (Wrong, Pros and Cons came out in 1984, ed.) which was once again a theatrical tour de force. The album and the stage show were demonic, often humorous meditations on the battle of the sexes and were punctuated with political overtones.
Radio KAOS, Waters' latest solo release, offers a surprising change up: optimism. Although it deals with familiar Floydian motifs such as paralysis, Armageddon, rebellion, and sheer craziness, its ultimate message is not of despair - but hope. The last song on the album is majestic, "The Tide Is Turning," which is simply the best song ever written by a man whose career is filled with brilliant moments.
Based around a fictitious Radio Station KAOS, the album explores the relationship between Jim, a renegade disc-jockey fighting an uphill battle against format-controlled radio, and Billy and "unusual" phone-in listener. Billy and Jim share a concern for the increasing domination of the market forces over everyday life: the DJ fears the total depersonalization of radio, while Billy fears that the misuse of satellite communications, far from bringing people together, has brought the Earth to the edge of destruction.
"The whole issue of the increasing takeover of broadcasting by market research-based programming is a subject of great concern," says Waters. "Its effect is to dramatically change the face of radio for the worse, and the effect does not only apply to radio. If you are governed by the lowest commercial denominator, you end up with no good Rock & Roll stations, only New Age stations, no theater, only soap opera, and no ordinary people, only Rambo."
Roger Waters, media-wise, is reclusive. Music, Computers, & Software (MCS) Magazine is pleased to be included in his first series of interviews in over a decade. Waters was thoughtful, articulate, politically aware and controversial. Although his conversation was not "widget" obsessed, his comments on technology and how it affects our lives and his music make this interview vital reading to any thoughtful musician creating in today's topsy-turvy global village.
MCS:
Roger:
MCS:
Roger:
There is a possible danger that social commentary in music may become more rare because the frivolous end is nice and easy to market. Also the artist that specializes in lighter forms of entertainment can usually be easily manipulated by the "powers that be" in our business who may find that more convenient than working with artists with strong convictions. I don't see it as a problem so much now, but record companies tend to go with whatever is the quickest and easiest; they have to because record companies do not stand alone, they have to report to a board of directors who are interested in profits and that's the bottom line.
Is rock music still a valid platform for making big statements?
Yes, I think Live Aid changed things, if only to show how technology and satellite based communications can be used to make people understand each other better. It's very easy to become depressed and defeated about rock's impudence, especially coming off the end of the second term of Reagan's Republican America and eight years of Thatcherism in England. One is faced with at least half a generation that accepts and adopts the ideologies embodied by those two personalities; and they may seem like an inviolate bastion against which attacks of any free thinking humanitarian or liberal musical group will have no effect, but these things tend to be cyclical. I think that the Nineties will be more open and the new generation that waits by their radio will be more receptive to a bit of breast beating than this lot.
Are you puzzled by the lack of social responsibility that your peers have? Should music be more political and less frivolous?
It doesn't concern me what other people in the business do, as long as there is space for people who are concerned and politically motivated.
MCS:
There is a continuing theme flowing throughout your work - from Dark Side of the Moon to the present Radio KAOS - of time running out. However, as opposed to your previous albums, there seems to be a light at the end of this tunnel... or are those just the headlights of an on-coming train?
Roger:
I very seriously think that there is a light. My hope is that all the advances your magazine is about can lead towards a day where it will be easier for us to talk to each other, and nation talk to nation. The more channels of communications are opened up, as in the recent proliferation of home computers and telecommunications, the greater our chances of survival, along with the cockroaches and the other species that look like they may have a slightly better chance of being here a thousand years from now.I believe that man is finally catching up with technology, and the home computer revolution means that technology is diversifying into the hands of the people, slowly but surely. There will be more and more information available to us as individuals, which will allow us to make up our own minds about what is right and wrong. We developed the hydrogen bomb too early and thank God we got past the Cuban Missile Crisis, and I'm sure we've been closer than that; but in "The Tide Is Turning," the last song on the album, I express my optimism. No one wants a World War anyway, it's too costly. It's just that, especially in America, the idea of one is such a strong propaganda tool. But it's becoming easier and easier for us to believe that Russia will not over run us.
MCS:
Has digital technology made it easier for you to get your ideas onto tape?
Roger:
Probably, but my involvement with it is limited. I met with loads of producers before meeting Ian Ritchie, and usually all I'm interested in is whether they understand what I'm talking about - the technological stuff that Ian knew was a bonus. However, most producers are familiar with sequencing because it makes life easier.I don't really like the sound of programmed drums, unless they're used in a particular way. On this record almost all the bass and snare drums are programmed, but Graham Broad, who specializes in working with the technology, came in and brilliantly played just the top kit which humanized the programmed parts. Programming the bass (drum) and snare took all the drudgery away from trying to get the basic pulse correct, so we used the machine instead of doing a bunch of takes. Then by having someone like Graham come in, who'll add a great hi-hat part, gives you the best of both worlds.
MCS:
So you're more of a director?Roger:
No, no... because I make fairly complete demos before we even start to record. Part of the work in the studio is trying desperately to recreate what I did on the demo, such as whether I had the DX7 MIDIed to the E-mu and was it hooked up to the SPX90.Unfortunately, the demos are usually unusable because they are slightly out of tune or whatever, but the vibe is almost always there. What Ian brought solidly to the record was a strong feel for what should happen rhythmically. I'd never worked with a drum machine before I started making these demos, and all my programming sounded stodgy. It's a real art to get all the offsets and to find the right kind of kit for the song.
On the sampling end, we used some of our own sounds and some factory sounds. The Morse Code, which spells out actual messages throughout the album, and doubles as a rhythmic device, was painstakingly inserted via computer so that we were sure to get the intervalic spaces correct without disturbing the feel of the music.
MCS:
What is your home studio like?
Roger:
It's a smallish room, and I use a Trident Series 80 board because it's very simple. We went to an SSL room to mix.
MCS:
In the period between Meddle and Dark Side of the Moon, there seems to be a great change in the direction of your writing, from long experimental instrumentals to shorter, tighter, conceptual songs. What happened?
Roger:
I suppose what happened is that I found something to say.
MCS:
I've noticed a lot of humorous elements in your songs...
Roger:
Well, thank God for that!
MCS:
For instance, the Sam Kineson-like rage and bluster in "Go Fishing" on Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking. Does it bother you that many people seem to miss that aspect in your music?
Roger:
Yes, it bothers me a bit. Once critics pigeonhole you, they tend not to think about your work too much. They've pegged me as a dour, depressed, megalomaniac, melodramatic, and most don't like what I do. They wouldn't spot the humor because it's inconvenient.
MCS:
I felt "Radio Waves," the first single off the album, was being ironic because you used the conventions of a pop song to criticize a Top 40 radio format.
Roger:
The lyrics are clearly ironic: "AM, FM, weather and news. Our leaders had a frank exchange of views." But there was no irony intended in the music. What I was interested in was the high G running in Morse Code over the top of the chord progression of G Major, A minor7, and C Major.
MCS:
How do you approach the concept in your records?
Roger:
What I tend to do is just allow something to come. I go into a very passive state and try to allow any thoughts or feeling I have about my life or life in general, rise to the surface. Sometimes I don't have any idea, even after I start writing, what the record will be about.The first song I wrote for this record never even made it onto the final product. It was a ballad called "Get Back To Radio," and thematically it was about growing older and wondering whether I was any good anymore. The lyrics went:
Like an ember glowing in the dark
I had almost grown cold,
Frozen like a soldier
standing by the flag pole,
Like a flare they said was too old
I was tempted to hand in my key...
That was the first I had started writing about any of this stuff. Later on it says:
Like a volcano getting ready to blow,
the new generation waits for its radio...
That triggered something in me that allowed the other things to come out. It started me thinking about my relationship to radio, where it comes from I don't know.
MCS:
Has having a low media profile helped you get around the "I hope I die before I get old" syndrome in rock music? You've never focused in on a young pop image.
Roger:
Possibly, the preconception of what is and what is not a rock Ôn' roll performer is one that will have to disappear soon anyway, because as an art form, rock is very young.Jazz didn't have the same problem because it was accepted that it was handed down by very old men, the early jazz players learned what they learned from their fathers and grandfathers.
Which we did too, in a way, but from Chuck Berry's father and Bo Diddley's father because the roots of this stuff is in American black music. Each successive generation of young girls will need Bon Jovi's to scream at, but rock will never be only that.
MCS:
It's turning into more of a folk music...
Roger:
There will always be people who will want to say something and use this medium. Particularly people like myself who've grown up with it and it's a form we understand. I've done my apprenticeship, I've paid my dues, I know how to make records and as long as I enjoy doing it, I'll go ahead and do it? I don't see it as a problem.
MCS:
What do you think about Dark Side of the Moon and its success?
Roger:
I think it's a very well constructed record, and this may sound pompous... well it is pompous, but I think the ideas touch some group unconscious so that succeeding generations recognize some part of themselves. It's not just a collection of good tunes, there are many other albums like that, it must be something more.Someone suggested that it tells the listener that it's alright to think that maybe they're going crazy. It gives you permission to feel bad about things.
MCS:
In retrospect, why do you think that Pros and Cons of HitchHiking was not critically well received?
Roger:
It wasn't a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am-far out-man rock Ôn' roll album, it was a very introspective piece about how I felt about my failed marriage, my feelings about sex and all kinds of difficult areas, and on the other hand it was a tribute to Bob Dylan. It was kind of like "Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands," which was always one of my favorite bits of music, a long drawn-out acoustical piece that goes on and on and on without going anywhere or doing anything in particular musically except building without jerking.
MCS:
Tell me about the tour?
Roger:
It will be Radio KAOS On The Road, it will be like a radio broadcast from whatever arena we'll be in that night.
MCS:
I hear you'll be taking calls live.
Roger:
Yes, whether it will be from phone booths within the arena or from lines from the outside, I'm not sure yet. It depends which is more satisfying to the audience and also which is more realistic to put together. I think it might be better from within the arena because I'll be able to make a better connection with the audience, and it will be more unpredictable that way. That's the idea behind Radio KAOS - an escape from regulation!
The End.