Roger:

Bob, good morning.

Bob: I

trust you are well and healthy and settled in there in London.

Roger:

Well, healthy and sleepy.

Bob:

(laughs) It is a...I believe 4:30 in the morning in London right now. Again we thank Roger for getting up at this God awful hour. So much happens sonicly Roger on Amused To Death, let's talk about the new CD for a moment, listening to it is almost like going to see a film in a theater. How long were you in the studio to create the desired affects for this record, there's so much detail in here?

Roger:

Well the mixing process took about eight months I suppose, last year...and a bit of the year before, but we've been putting songs together for the last four or five years.

Bob:

And a...going into...the first song we're gonna play which is "Three Wishes," um, tell us a little bit about that song. What was going on in your mind when you wrote that? It seems like if you've been working for five years it may have been a while ago since you wrote it but what do you recollect about the song writing process and what you were trying to convey in this?

Roger:

It is. It is. That one was one of the early songs so it was some time ago. Well it's the old three wishes story, you know? The gene comes out of the bottle and before you know it you've had your three wishes and you never got 'round to the thing you really wanted, in this case true love.

Bob:

We're gonna play that song right now and then talk with Roger Waters momentarily and of course your phone calls too on Rock Line and the Global Satellite Network.

(Three Wishes played)

Bob:

"The old three wishes story" as Roger put it. Roger Waters from Amused To Death. That is an edited version that is currently available at radio stations and you just heard it on Rock Line and the Global Satellite Network. Now if one of your three wishes is to speak with Roger live on the telephone or on the satellite here you have plenty of time to do so. Pick up the phone and call us on one toll free at l-800-344-ROCK.

(commercial break)

Bob:

And welcome back to Rock Line. I'm Bob Coburn. It's an evening with Roger Waters. I'm gonna hit the phones right now for Roger Waters whose live in London. Theadora is our first caller in North Hollywood a listener of 95 . 5 KLOS. Good morning or hi I should say ( laughs ) . Good morning to Roger and good evening to you, Theadora.

Theadora:

Um...it's really a wonderful thing when we can have intelligent people in the music industry that can present a cohesive amount of music...a, there's a certain anathemic quality to your music Roger and with regards to Radio KAOS, do you really, um...do you feel like maybe it might have hurt your chances getting any solo air play because of the fact that Radio KAOS really took the programmers to task?

Roger:

I don't know. I don't know. That's a...I, maybe. Maybe. Who knows. But a...you know, we don't choose what we write I'm happy to say. Writing songs is the difficult bit of the end of the business that I'm in and a...it's , it's so difficult that those of us who write songs have little choice in the matter so if I'm a...if that's what I have to write songs about I do and whether people play them or not is, is kind of up to them...

Bob:

So how...

Roger:

...but thank you for your comments.

Bob:

...how radio programmers or anyone like that might respond, you really don't care about. You, your goal is to...

Roger:

Well I'm happy to say...

Bob:

...to write the song you're comfortable with, huh?

Roger:

That's right and I'm happy to say that um, Jim Ladd who ...who you all know very well, you know, who made that record with me and came on the road with me, seems to at least have found himself a decent job, which is nice.

Bob:

Theadora, thanks for the call. It's Russell's turn as we head to Huntington, Indiana. WVYR the Bear in Fort Wayne is our station. Russell you're on the Rock Line.

Russell:

Hi, Roger. I'm thrilled to talk to a rock legend.

Roger:

Hi, Russell.

Russell:

I a...I seen your tour, Radio KAOS tour at a...Wembly Arena when I was living in England and it was great and a...I had a question...how you met up with Andy Fairweather Low?

Roger:

(takes a deep breath) Andy Fairweather Low, how did I meet up with him. I...when I was going into the a...second bit of the Pros and Cons of HitchHiking tour in eighty, whenever that was...eighty five I think it was...um, I was looking around for guitarists and I bumped into Andy from time to time since I first met him on tour in nineteen sixty...eight? We did a tour together when he was in a band called Amen Corner, and we did one of the last kind of rock package tours 'round England a...and the headliner was Jimmy Hendrix. It was Jimmy Hendrix, Pink Floyd, the Nice, Amen Corner, and...another band...who I can't remember. And so I'd known him for all those years and a...he'd been working with Eric Clapton and Eric Clapton was working with me on Pros and Cons and I asked Eric what Andy was like and he said he's great so I gave him a ring and he came around and the rest is...happy.

Bob:

Yeah (laughs). Done alot of projects with him over the years. Russell, that's a good call, thank you. It's Billy's turn as we head to Waterbury, Connecticut and 106 WHCN in Hartford is our affiliate there. (and we've got Billy on the line. ed.) Billy, you're on the Rock Line with Roger Waters.

Billy:

(I hear radio waves in my head. ed.) Yes, hello Mr. Waters.

Roger:

Hi.

Billy:

Ah, on the first track, 'The Ballad of Bill Hubbard,' on... and also at the end of the title track of Amused To Death, you incorporate Alf Razzell of the Royal Fusiliers talking about his experience in World War I with private William Hubbard a... I was wondering how do you feel this moving story...weaves itself into ATD with it's modern day social and political scandals?

Roger:

(sighs) Well that should be easy to answer in fifteen seconds.

Bob:

(laughs)

Roger:

Um, I don't know. What struck me about Alf Razzell a....was the extraordinary humanity, it's a...of his story in that he had been living with his concern, having left his friend in no mans land seventy years a... before and that um, he'd carried that kind of burden with him and a... I guess it struck me that we help each other a little um, to sort out those burdens that each of us individually has. Though I have to say that if I'm optimistic about the future, which I am, it is largely because (takes a deep breath) um, I don't know, through modern tele-communications, ("and the pressures of the market place, the human race has civilized itself" ed.) and this is the positive side of tele-communications, we seem to be getting better at a...understanding each other and helping each other personally with our individual problems.

Bob:

It's very stirring to hear his, I guess you would call it monologue, on the album a... it's very heartfelt and, and very passionate. Are you surprised that after seventy-four years he still carries pains of guilt for something that happened in World War II or do you think that's just human nature?

Roger:

I think that's what we're like, you know? I think that one of the great things about human beings in that they carry all those feelings with them. But also it, it... when, when you hear one individuals experience that it, it lends support to the notion that we need to become passionate with one another and help one another.

Bob:

Billy, another good call. You're very obviously well into the record and a...enjoy it. There's alot in there to get into. We'll find out what's on Ken's mind right now as we go to Philadelphia. 94 WYSP is our affiliate and Ken, you're on the Rock Line.

Ken:

Hi Roger, how are you?

Roger:

Hi Ken. I'm good thankyou.

Ken:

Ah, your solo albums and things like 'The Wall' or 'The Final Cut' have all had central themes and story lines. I wanted to know, when your working on new material, do you write with a specific narrative in mind or do you write a series of songs, and a theme naturally emerges?

Roger:

Ah, normally the latter a...certainly to start with and then a theme will develop and I may fill in the gaps, you know, the bits and pieces a... afterwards but yeah, normally the, the thread is whatever is going on in my heart for the period of time that writing particular songs a... and it's my need to make sense of it that, that a...provides the theme.

Bob:

You co-produced this album with Patrick Leonard a...alot of people think of Madonna when they think of him but a...this shows some real diversity on his part co-producing an album like this with you, doesn't it?

Roger:

Uh yeah, well...well Pat um, grew up in Michigan and a ...he told me when we first met, that he came to a Pink Floyd concert when... I believe it was when Dark Side Of The Moon was still called 'Eclipse', so it must have been in '73, I guess, or maybe...yeah, '73 and a... you know, he was one of those 13 year old, 14 year old kids in the front row sitting there with their mouths open and...and he kind of fell in love with the whole idea of the thing at that point and a...so this was kind of ambition fulfilled for him and um, we had a terrific time together. He's very accomplished musician and producer.

Bob:

Now, in co-producing did it ever come down to who had the final say. Did you ever have to pull rank and say no, this is the way we're doing it Patrick?

Roger:

No, absolutely not because Pat completely understands that it's my record and that if there's any question of a final say it rests with me so he wouldn't. He would, he would um, if he felt something about anything he would argue his points viciously but at the end of the day he has to go with my instincts finally. He said that to me often which, you know, and he's quite right.

Bob:

We're going to play "Watching TV". We have taken some liberties with the music tonight um, we're not playing all of everything. You need to get the CD to listen to everything all the way through and if you have not heard it all the way through you should. It, it is really amazingly well put together and very thought provoking. We're gonna play "Watching TV". This was inspired by the incidents in China wasn't it Roger?

Roger:

Yeah. It's a song that I wrote the day after the Tiananmen Square massacre stuff all over my TV screen.

Bob:

...and exemplifies really what one person can do in this world isn't it?

Roger:

Yeah, that's the idea at the end of the song. If we're only playing the first half you won't get to the punch line which is that...the notion is that, it's about one individual girl who is killed in Tiananmen Square and the fact that her death is important because it occurs on television and therefore moves a large number of people and in that way as I say in the second chorus at the end of the song, she's different from you know, the unknown Nicaraguan or the Rosenbergs or the unknown Jew because she died on TV.

Bob:

Get the second half on the CD. Get the first half right now on Rock Line. "Watching TV" on the radio, live and nation wide.

(Watching TV played)

Bob:

Roger Waters, our guest on Rock Line tonight. We have Pete on the line in Paul Smiths, New York, listening to Picks 106 in Albany. Pete, welcome to the show.

Hi, thanks. I'd like to say hello to God, also known as Roger Waters (Bob and Pete laugh) and I'd like to ask him, having knowledge that most of today's popular music, that (like dance music and other children's listening songs,)...consist mainly of bits and pieces of other artists work, how does he feel about, ...that the issue of sampling, as far as influencing music and creativity, um, will affect the music industry, and does he really feel that the children of the video age are, or will be amused to death?

Roger

(humph) Well, that's an interesting question and its one that a...we're all going to find the answer out to. I think not, and I certainly hope not. I hate a ...the whole idea of sampling you know, nothing is more loathsome. Well, there are more loathsome things but, um, Marky Mark having a hit record with "Walk On The Wild Side" was something that turned my stomach to a large degree, and I don't like that, using of other peoples...mind you, Lou Reed doesn't seem to mind so why should I, but there's something about it that affects me and that I don't like... but I think that people who think their own thoughts and write there own music and um, who's basic motivation is not the bottom line ($) are beginning to have more impact, you know? There's a ...I think there's a new kind of honesty developing in some of the young bands. They're playing their own instruments now. They're...people are finally beginning to understand that sampling ...that doing covers of songs to cash in... those days are over, [takes a deep breath] and that electronic recording technology doesn't have the absolute answer to all Gods questions.

Bob:

I know Brian May of Queen on this program took offense to Vanilla Ice and what they did with "Under Pressure" and a... even said on this show, "We're gonna kick his ice!" and they did! (laughs) There was a law suit over that one. Pete, thank you. It's David's turn. He's in Indianapolis. Q95 is our affiliate. David your on with Roger Waters.

David:

Hello, Roger. Congratulations on Amused To Death. It's definitely the best sounding album I've ever heard...and I was wondering how that compares to the holophonics stereo you used on The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking?

Roger:

Well, it's completely...it's a different system. Q Sound is designed primarily for speakers, whereas the Holophonics system was for a...head phones. That's number one. Number two, Holophonics was invented by Mangun Hugo Zuccarelli, an Argentinean who was, um, slightly crazed and very, very secretive (laughs) about what the thing actually was, and so although we knew it did something, nobody I think to this day knows exactly what. Q sound comes from Calgary from a couple of Canadians ...and a Russian working together and um, there not secretive about it. They're very pragmatic about it and so we know exactly what their system does. Ah...it, it divides any signal into a left and right component and so it works within the stereo system and it introduces, um, minute delays at different frequency levels into, into the left and right component to make your brain think that the sound is coming not from in front of you, from the two speakers, but from in any one of a number of other positions around you and a...but you have to be sitting right between the two speakers. I mean exactly...to within like an inch or an inch and a half of either side of the central perpendicular axis.

Bob:

Hmmmm

Roger:

...and it is an amazing effect, as you've rightly noticed.

Bob:

Another good call. I think we have a very bright crowd listening to tonight's Rockline. David, thank you for your call. ...It's Brian's turn as we head to Rochester, New York. 96 WCMF is our station there and we welcome Brian to the show.

Brian:

Hello, Roger. It's quite and honor...

Roger:

Hi Brian.

Brian:

...to talk to you, and it's been well worth the wait for the new Amused to Death album.

Roger:

Thank you.

Brian:

I have two questions for you tonight...

Roger:

OK.

Brian:

...and the first one...in the song "Too Much Rope" you say, 'Each man has his price Bob and yours was pretty low,' are you referring to Bob Ezrin?

Roger:

Strangely enough, alot of the lyrics that I write now, I write directly onto tape and a... by putting some music down on a track and then going into the studio and running the tape and then singing directly without thinking too much about what it is. And those verses of "Too Much Rope", I did like that. Ah, the reference when I actually put the word down on tape was to Bob Dillon because at the time, um, I was going through a ... a kind of Bob Dillon sound alike period to a...amuse myself in the studio and a... so I would be singing, (Rog drifts into his Dillonesque voice) "Each man has his price Bob" like that for a joke... but afterwards it seemed to me rather an appropriate lyric for Bob Ezrin so, um, I left it in because of Ezrin ...as a...as a little gift for Bob Ezrin, yeah.

Bob:

So, Dillon in mind but if it works the other way, no problem with that either, huh?

Roger:

(in Dillonesque voice) Das right, das right!

Bob:

(laughs) Brian, question number two...

Brian:

Um, I would also like to know what part 'Flea' of the Red Hot Chili Peppers had to do on your album, he's mentioned in the special thanks?

Roger:

Yeah he is, um, strangely enough I was talking to an English journalist whose very into bootlegs and bits and pieces and who is, you know, he was complaining about the new Pink Floyd boxed set because... cause there wasn't anything special in it. Reasonably enough in my view... but that's another story, um, and a... we were talking about the possibility of releasing demos, you know, as he said, "you should release your demos sometime as an album," and I thought well that's not a bad idea. We, we recorded "It's A Miracle" three times, and second time we recorded it we did a very up tempo version of it. A... and Flea came in and played bass and wonderfully he played too, he was great. I loved it. But when we put the record together, um, this very kind of up tempo version of "It's A Miracle" didn't fit within the dynamic context of the rest of the record so the very last piece of recording we did was to re-record "It's A Miracle," and just Pat and I sat down one afternoon at the piano and re-did it.

Bob:

Brian, couple a good questions. Call us again sometime please. Brian, from Rochester, New York. Well, we've mentioned Bob Ezrin, the boxed set, um, I guess right before Christmas David Gilmour and Nick Mason were on Rock Line (talking about the new Floyd boxed set)...you were not really involved in this nine CD Pink Floyd boxed set were you Roger?

Roger:

No, I wasn't.

Bob:

Did that...did that bother you?

Roger:

Ah, yeah. Yeah, it bothers me. The way our back catalog is... is run is through a company that we're all shareholders in, but because, um, Dave and Nick out vote me on the board of that company, I don't have any say in what happens to the catalog...

Bob:

And I...

Roger:

...Which I find extremely irritating but there we are. Such is life.

Bob:

...I got the impression that there's been no movement between the three of you a...no, no fence mending or anything like that has taken place?

Roger:

Very little.

Bob:

That's a shame.

Roger:

No, there hasn't been any. Well is it? I don't know, we... it, it is a strange thing. It's something that, um, lots of fans of the music attach to a...but the music's still there. The work that we did in the past I think was very good you know? We all contributed to it a... it was a very good period I think, in all of our lives and the fact that we've fallen out musically, philosophically, a... politically, ...and in every other possible imaginable way, um, I think... does no kind of discredit to what we did together and a...we all make our choices in life you know and a...sometimes you fall out with people and its not the worst thing in the world.

Bob:

We'll be back with Roger Waters in just a moment on Rock Line and the Global Satellite Network.

(Commercial Break)

Bob:

...And welcome back to Rock Line and our evening with Roger Waters. I'm Bob Coburn. Eric is on the line in Sacramento, California, a listener of 93 ROCK and Eric, here's Roger for ya'.

ERIC:

Good morning Roger!

Roger:

Morning.

Eric:

Good morning, a...Amused To Death, it's a very...very great album. What it did for me...what started me off into your music was the early 1970's at Winterland, the Meddle tour... The Dark Side Of The Moon debut...

Roger:

Right.

Eric:

...ah, it was incredible sound then. Why do you think Quadraphonic sound didn't make it, I mean to follow the line of that album...that concept?

Roger:

Um, As a home thing I think it didn't make it because you needed to have four speakers and um, the system that the industry adopted was pretty archaic. The encoding and decoding was bad and also they set the system up as front left, front right, back left, back right over four tracks and the human brain doesn't register that. I think for it to have worked decently, they should have done it like we used to do it live, which was to have the front information as a stereo image left and right, but then a... the surrounding information to be left, right, and behind because that's the way we think. We don't think back left, back right. We think...(drifts into Dillonesque voice again) is it on my left? Is it on my right? Is it behind me? Is it in front of me? That's the way the brain works and so they made a fundamental error, I think, encoding it into four tracks of information. If they were gonna do that, they should have had a mono signal in the middle of the front, a left signal, a right signal, and a back signal and it would have been much more dramatic and interesting.

Bob:

There you go, Eric. Some information that'll help you understand that. A, Roger, as you've heard a moment ago, is very proud of what he did with Pink Floyd in the past and we have put together a Dark Side Of The Moon montage for ya. Let's listen to that now on Rock Line and The Global Satellite Network.

(DSOTM montage played)

Bob:

That was a montage from Dark Side Of The Moon featuring Roger Waters, our guest on Rock Line. I got a question for you Roger... I was curious if Amused To Death is part III of a trilogy that includes The Wall and The Dark Side Of The Moon? Is there anything to that?

Roger:

(laughs)

Bob:

...or is that totally... out of left field?

Roger:

Yeah. I don't think you can make that connection. However, I... It's strange you should say that because a...they seem, there seems to be some connection. People seem to connect them. I certainly do, you know, in my mind. I think, (takes a deep breath) there's something similar certainly.

Bob:

Oh, I feel better now (laughs).. Gosh! (laughs). Left it hang'in in the wind out there!

Roger:

Y-y-y-yeah.

Bob:

Ah, Jim , It's your turn. Jim is in Louisville, Kentucky listening to 95.7 WQMF. Jim here's Roger for you.

Jim:

How's it go'in?

Roger:

Good.

Jim:

I, uh, had one question. Uh, I noticed in your new album, uh, there's alot of grrrreat guitar work. Uh, Jeff Back is just...excellent choice. I was wondering what it was like to work with him?

Roger:

Magical. Yeah, absolutely wonderful. I've always loved the way he plays the guitar. And, uh, I guess we worked with him for maybe three or four days, er, to do the stuff that he does on the album and, uh, it was terrific. He writes at the studio. He actually had a brand new guitar. He gets it out of the box. He doesn't seem to tune it, you know? He sits and leans with his bum on a studio multi-track and, and you run the track and uh, he starts kind of doing these magical things and then kind of looks at you and says "Is that the sort of thing you want?" you know, and you say no it's not and then you tell him what you do want (Bob and Rog laugh) and he does that magically as well and, and it really is...What I find extraordinary is that unless you can watch his fingers really closely and you still can't work out how he's doing it, you know? He's quite amazing!

Bob:

He is one of really a handful of the "cut above" guitarists. He's, he's in a certain group. The, Clapton, Hendrix. Jimmy Page, uh, Jeff Beck, uh...and you worked with some other good guitarists, Andy Fairweather Low, whose name came up a little earlier, Steve Lukather also. Also on this record, Don Henley, Rita Coolidge, Flea who got mentioned, earlier, and you got to work with the late Jeff Porcaro too, didn't you Roger?

Roger:

Yeah. In fact he was, that was the very last piece of recording we did. As I mentioned before, we re-recorded, um, "It's A Miracle" and uh, it suddenly felt, it got, um, we reduced the tempo and made it much quieter. It's just a one piano, one synth and the voice, really, and um, we decided that it should have bass and drums in the middle and Jeff was working with Toto in the uh, in the studio down the hall, so we asked him to come in and do it and he did. Sad...

Bob:

Jim, thank you for your call. We have Trish on the line in Paddock Lake, Wisconsin. She's a listener of Laser 103 in Milwaukee, and Trish your on the Rock Line.

Trish:

Hi, Roger.

Roger:

Hi.

Trish:

Um, I was wondering was it your idea for the video for 'What God Wants" and if it was what gave you that idea for it?

Roger:

(laughs) Um, I had an idea at the beginning of, of the making of that video which was, uh, the idea that um, visually the album hangs on the idea of a gorilla whose a metaphor for the human race sitting watching television and trying to work out what his relationship is with the TV set and with all the other gorilla's. So as far as there's a gorilla and a television set in it, yeah, it was my idea, but... but, the rest of it's down to Tony Kay whose the man who made it.

Bob:

I think in some ways it takes alot of courage to put out a rock'n'roll album with a song on it called "What God Wants." I mean there are certain forums where it's OK to discuss God openly, there are others where it's a bit 'iffy' and you're going to be looked at with alot of scrutiny. Did that cross your mind at all or did you uh actually welcome that type of challenge?

Roger:

It's not a question of welcoming or not welcoming. As I said earlier in this program, we don't choose what we write, you know? I paint what I see and uh, take the consequences and uh, there's enough people out there who will happily uh, attempt to censor what I do without me censoring it myself. You know, before it...before it gets to you, if you see what I mean.

Bob:

Oh yeah.

Roger:

So uh, I kind of uh, leave that up to them. I.... I mean, uh, its that... that particular song has been widely misunderstood as I knew it would be... misunderstood, you know?

Bob: I

t has been. It really has been. I've had people take offense just at the title and not be able to explain why even.

Roger:

Yeah. Well it's a... my concern is that we take the name of God in vain and that uh, as was typified in the recent conflict in the gulf, uh, you know, there we all are dropping bombs and firing shells at each other all firmly believing that we're doing it in Gods name and uh, the paradox is, that we still don't seem to really understand that it's the same God, you know? It's just a belief in a different prophet.

(What God Wants played)

Bob:

Unmistakably Jeff Beck on that song from Amused To Death. Roger Waters' 'What God Wants, part I.' More with Roger Waters coming up in a moment on the Global Satellite Network.

(commercial break)

Bob:

Welcome back to Rock Line. I'm Bob Coburn, it's an evening with Roger Waters and everyone who gets to speak with Roger on the air tonight receives a copy of the latest album, Amused To Death. That is courtesy of Columbia Records. Joe's gonna get one. He's in Binghamton, New York listening to WKGB FM. Joe, your on the show:

Joe:

Uh, hello Mr. Waters.

Roger:

Hi, Joe.

Joe:

Hi, first I'd like to say that it's an honor to speak to you. I've been a big fan of yours since your early work with Pink Floyd and your current work now. Um, I have a question that's a little bit of Pink Floyd trivia for you, um, if you can remember back to the, on The Wall album, at the very beginning of the recording, and the very end, there are some almost inaudibly mumbled words, and in the book 'Saucerful of Secrets' by Nicholas Schaffner... um, he eludes that this might be a sentence that begins at the end of the album and ends at the beginning of the album and although the voice is almost inaudible, it sounds like it might be yours and I was wondering if you could clear up what that sentence is.

Roger:

Yeah, it is. Well spotted. If you, uh, make a tape recording on a reel to reel machine of the end of the album and then edit it onto the beginning of the album you'll find that the sentence runs straight through and the sentence is 'Isn't this where we came in?'

Bob:

(laughs) All those years and all that time, Joe, and now you finally have it. That's a... that's a fun call though. Way to go Joe! Uh, Jeremy...

Roger:

Yeah, well spotted.

Bob:

...yeah, very well done. Jeremy's gonna get his turn as we head to St. Louis. KSHE 95 FM is our station there and we welcome Jeremy to the Rock Line.

Jeremy:

Hi, Roger. How ya do'in? It's great to talk to you

Roger:

Good.

Jeremy:

Uh, my question is, ...at the The Wall Live in Berlin concert, did you seek out such a wide range of performers from the music world? Cause you had everything from The Scorpions to Cyndi Lauper, or did they all come to you asking to be part of the project?

Roger:

No, we went to all of them and loads and loads of other people as well. You Know, when your doing something like that you ask lots and lots of people. And, uh, some of them say yes and then hedge and you don't hear from them again or whatever and some of them say yes and turn up, you know? So it was a question of uh, putting a team together that could do the show...and we did, I'm happy to say. And... and uh, with one notable exception, they were all wonderful...but we're not going to talk about Sinead O'. We're not tonight. We've talked about her enough I think.

Bob:

I was just about to ask... but I don't need to now, do I? (laughs from both Bob and Roger) I was really glad that you involved The Scorpions in that, and talking to them before the show, they more than anyone especially, I think, uh, as far as the performers or anyone in the media, had a real sense of the history of where they were and what was happening. They and Ute Lemper. Um, They really knew what was going on. I mean they kept saying to me, 'Bob, do you realize where you're sitting?' I mean, 'people were dying a couple of years ago, literally, where we are right this moment,' and I think that really opened their eyes and they were very joyous over that weekend. It really meant alot to them I think.

Roger:

Yeah.

Bob:

Were they part of your plans in the beginning or did they come in later?

Roger:

Uh, well, I... I, I thought it would be good, you know, to have a heavy rock or heavy metal, I don't know what they call themselves, band doing "In The Flesh" which was written always as a sort of parody of that kind of music. So, I went and met them. They were recording in Holland and I went and met them and explained the idea to them and I liked them alot. They're a very nice bunch of guys and very kind of serious about what they do and um, I thought they did it brilliantly. They got the idea immediately and a... and you're right, they were able to make connections with where we were, and what we were doing, both they and Ute Lemper, in ways that those of us who weren't German couldn't.

Bob:

Jeremy, thank you for your call. We've taken the liberty to put together a "Wall" montage featuring Roger Waters on Rock Line.

(Wall montage is played)

Bob:

The Wall, featuring Roger Waters on Rock Line. I'm Bob Coburn back to the phones, we go to Fred... by the way, good job to our engineers for both montages tonight. Very well done. Fred is in Blacksburg, Virginia, listening to ROCK 105 in Christiansburg, and we welcome Fred to the Rock Line, Hi there.

Fred:

Good morning Roger.

Roger:

Good morning.

Fred:

It's appropriate that The Wall montage was just played because my question involves the recording of that album. In a January issue of Goldmine magazine, David Gilmour stated that of the original recordings for that release a great deal of finished material had to be edited out to fit into the constraints of a double album. Uh, but that these tapes still exist and are available and I wanted to know would there be any interest on your part in seeing the full, unedited edition prepared for release, and if the interest is there, would it require artistic cooperation between yourself and David?

Roger:

Um, to answer the second part of the question first, I think if the tapes were there, no it wouldn't. They could just do it without speaking to me. But I don't know what he's talking about (Rogers interest is very obviously peeked) I, I don't think there's a whole load of unreleased material. I certainly don't remember anything.

Bob:

Is it hard to walk away sometimes from great takes because you have one that's just slightly better. I mean, working with Jeff Beck, there must have been some things that you threw away that you would have loved to have kept and inserted into the piece.

Roger:

Yeah, but you always do that, you know, in anything and... the whole thing about producing a record is making those decisions all the time, you know? and there's always something about the different takes and you put bits from here and bits from there together and that's what making a record is all about. But I... I'm, interested in this question because I don't think this material exists. I don't know what Dave is talking about.

Bob:

You should have your people check it out cause a... Fred, let's bring Fred back, a... you saw it in Goldmine, is that correct Fred?

Fred:

Uh, yes sir. It was in a January issue of Goldmine (Magazine) and he was saying that there was enough material maybe to be a third album in the set but because of the constraints of the double album situation back in the '70's, unlike CD right now, there wasn't space for this additional material.

Bob:

...a little homework for you there Roger, (laughs).

Roger:

Well... well I don't know. I mean, Dave never had the faintest idea what the record was about anyway so...

Bob:

O...O...O-OK!! (Laughs) From Fred to Jeff. We head from Blacksburg, Virginia to Austin, Texas. KLBJ FM is our affiliate there. Jeff, your on with the outspoken Roger Waters.

Jeff:

Hello Mr. Waters, It's a pleasure.

Roger:

Hi.

Jeff:

In your opinion, at what point did Pink Floyd peak, peak out and a... what was your biggest, most meaningful contribution to the group?

Roger:

Um, I think as a group we peaked with Dark Side of the Moon and a... I think my most meaningful contribution was sometime after that... was maybe... maybe writing The Wall.

Bob:

Interesting. (stammers) I was very curious to hear your answer in that. So you think the band peaked with Dark Side ... and your most valuable contribution is The Wall ?

Roger:

Yeah, it wasn't, I mean by the time The Wall happened it wasn't really very much of a band anymore. We were sort of... Wish You Were Here was a pretty uncomfortable experience. We... you know, when people start their bands as, as anybody whose been in a band will know, you know, we all rehearse in our garages and living rooms and we all have this notion about being successful and um, standing on stage and people applauding and anybody who goes into Rock 'N 'Roll is always driven by, is always motivated by those factors as well as wanting to make money, and some of us maybe wanting to communicate some of our ideas and a... When you have your first really kind of big hit album, you kind of fulfill lot's of the functions that a... you got together for in the first place and with Pink Floyd, that point was reached with Dark Side of the Moon and after that there was alot of clinging together because it was safe, you know, because we had achieved a certain amount of success and it seemed like a good idea to stay together under a... nice kind of cozy umbrella of the trade mark and so we did for many years and I'm happy that we did because we produced some really good work after that, but it really didn't feel like we were all in it together anymore in quite the same way after that point. That's why I say that was the peak.

Bob:

Jeff, thanks for the call. We'll return with Roger Waters in just a moment on the Global Satellite Network. I'm, Bob Coburn, your number to call toll free 1-800-344-ROCK.

(Commercial break)

Bob:

Hey, you came back! Good choice. Roger Waters is on Rock Line tonight. Alan is taking his turn from Oklahoma City, Rock 100.5 "The Cat" is our station there and Alan, your on the Rock Line.

Alan:

Hi, Roger.

Roger:

Alan, hi.

Alan:

I was kind of wondering mainly like with The Final Cut,... You opened yourself up alot emotionally in that album and I'm wondering if that is frightening for you... to expose yourself that much?

Roger:

Um, yeah, I think it is for everybody, you know. Strangely enough, that's what the, you know , the end of The Wall was all about, which is why that was such a good kind of experience for me cause in writing The Wall, I actually get to that at the end of the thing in the trial sequence where Pink the central character, exposes a... is sentenced to expose himself before his peers and tears down his wall. I think it's any artists responsibility, to you know, share all that whether it's a painter or a musician of a writer or whoever. That's what we do... and if we don't, you know, we don't expose ourselves, then probably what we're doing isn't all that interesting.

Bob:

Wow! Alan, good call, Thanks. Let's see what Dan has on his mind. Dan is in Philadelphia listening to 94 WYSP and Dan, your on with Roger Waters.

Dan:

Morning Roger.

Roger:

Hi.

Dan:

Um, two questions for ya. Um, first question, Really... First I wanted to thank you for a powerful and insightful collection of songs. Um, it was really worth the wait. A question on a... question on the song "It's a Miracle"...I'm sorry, on "Three Wishes." I wanted to know if the second wish was in any way a reference to getting back with David Gilmour?

Bob:

(Laughs) Ok. Next question.

Roger:

(Laughs) Hay-y-y-y (in Dillonesque)

Bob:

Anything else tonight Dan? (more laughs from Bob and Roger).

Dan:

The other question I had is really in reference to The Pros and Cons of HitchHiking. Do you think that it's possible at all for mankind as a whole to really grasp the moment of clarity that slips away from the narrators grasp at the end of the album? Do you think it's possible for mankind as a whole to really view the rest of humanity as exactly what it is, as human persons, or do you think we're forced to, um, view each other simply as, as objects?

Roger:

That's a... That's a good question. That particular lyric was written within the terms of reference of the microcosm of a man and woman in bed together on there own, you know, so to take it into the larger arena of the way we all view the rest of humanity, a... I don't know. These are the kind of questions that people... Asimov and Arthur C. Clark, have addressed in novels like "Childhoods End," and things about the evolution of the human race and also questions that are addressed by Buddhism and by all kinds of philosophers in the last five thousand years of so. We have to remember that history is short, as I say in one of the songs on the record, and we haven't been looking at these questions for very long. Five thousand years is not a long time to have been writing stuff down. So... I don't know. I don't know... But we all recognize those moments of clarity when they happen, you know. And we all understand their quicksilver nature and the way that they slip away from us and that moment when it seems so right. We know that there's something more to the way the human mind works than a... looking to the bottom of the sheet and seeing whether we've made a profit or a loss, because we've all awoken from dreams and felt that we've made a connection with something that is more meaningful than that. So... I don't know.

Bob:

As we roll "It's A Miracle" underneath us (It's a Miracle played in the background) by Roger Waters from Amused To Death I'll pose this question. When you write songs and create an album, are responses like Dan's that you just got, what you hoped for? That you can take a microcosm of a situation, and someone like Dan can hear it and expand on it, expound upon it and take it to another interpretation? Is that what you hope people will do with your music?

Roger:

I just a... you know, if I move people and they listen to something and they get a shiver down their spines then I've fulfilled my function. If I make them think about something, above their own lives, and about the way they relate to other human beings, than that's an added bonus. I've been listening to Neil Young's new album recently. When we cook dinner in the evenings we put it on and listen to it, you know? "I'm a Dreaming Man" (sings the title verse) maybe that's my problem. I can relate to that.

Bob:

Roger Waters on Rock line.

(It's A Miracle is played)

Bob:

From Amused to Death, Roger Waters, an abbreviated version of "It's a Miracle." Jeff Porcaro with the drums on that track. More with Roger coming up in a moment on Rock Line and the Global Satellite Network.

(commercial break)

Bob:

Welcome back to Rock Line. I', Bob Coburn. Roger Waters is our guest... has been and continues to be for the entire 90 minutes. We have time for Jason's call in Westerville, Ohio. Jason is a listener of QFM 96 in Columbus, Hi!

Jason:

Hi... Hi Roger. First of all I'd like to give you about a million compliments... a million questions but a... can't do that so I'll ask a question about your new album Amused To Death. When I first listened to it, like this summer, um, I noticed on your third track "Perfect Sense Part 1," at the beginning, it sounds like a... there's a guy yelling off of maybe a TV probably and then I hear your voice talking and a... I figured out it was backwards so I... I figured out most of it backwards which is... "We have decided to record a backwards message just for you and your" other (something) partners, or something and a... I was wondering what exactly it was before that (chuckles from Bob, Rog, and Jason) ...and what the guy was yelling at the beginning of that because I'm... (Bob laughs some more)... really trying to figure out exactly what that was and...

Roger:

So what you recorded... What you did was recorded that bit of the record and turned the tape around and listened to it.

Jason:

Well I... I recorded it onto a video editing machine at a TV station and I played it exactly backwards and the vocals come out a left channel, and the tune... I don't know...

Roger:

OK, alight. Well, well done! I... A number of people know that I often put a message on records that I make. There's one on The Wall, and there's one on a few other bits and a... and um, over that particular piece of "Perfect Sense Pt. 1" we had a bit from "2001," you know, the Kubrick movie, the bit where Dave is turning off the Hal 2000 computer and the computer says... (in a deep, breathy voice)... "Stop, Dave..." I don't know if you remember it, and there's all this breathing in the background. It's a great scene. It's been sampled and used on a million different records. Anyway, I stupidly asked Stanley Kubrick for permission to use it as background on that particular track and he hummed and hawed for ages and ages and eventually refused me permission to use it on the grounds that it would open the flood gates and lots of other people would use it, and my protestations that he was closing the stable door after the horse had bolted fell on deaf ears. So, I made my own, which is why you've got me breathing on there which sounds a bit like that thing, and that was a backwards message for Stanley Kubrick. So, " yel-natS " (pronounced "hail nutS" on the track) backwards we now all know is Stanley, see?

Bob:

Oh-h-h-h-h, there you go.

Roger:

And the shouting at the beginning... I wouldn't like to tell you what that is but it's the mad Scotsman having a quiet word with Stanley Kubrick about not giving me permission to use that particular stuff on the record.

Bob:

There you go Jason, good call... and Jason, get a hobby would ya? Thanks to every body for listening and for calling tonight. Great calls. Just a tremendous night of phone calls. Special thanks tonight for Kid Leo and Pamela Edwards from Columbia Records, Mark Fenwick of EG Management Ltd., David West and Maria Murphy of Capitol Radio... and finally... Oh, I forgot one... Lamb Catering in London. We could not have done the show without Lamb Catering in London tonight. And of course, thanks to our guest Roger Waters. Roger, a quick 90 minutes and thankyou for it.

Roger:

Not at all, thank you.

Bob:

All right. Enjoy the London mourning. I'm, Bob Coburn and I'll be seeing you in a week.