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Roger Waters will take The Wall on the road this autumn, 30 years after Pink Floyd first performed the classic double album onstage. Three decades ago, Pink Floyd played the album in its entirety as a white brick wall was constructed between the band and the crowd throughout the show. Films were projected onto the wall during the performance and giant inflatable Gerald Scarfe creatures floated above the audience. In short, it was one of the greatest stage shows of its time during its brief run, and now Waters is promising to bring an updated version of the legendary set into the 21st century.

Check out our collection of classic Pink Floyd photos.

The Wall boasts Pink Floyd classics including “Comfortably Numb,” “Another Brick in the Wall Pt. 2,” “Mother,” “Run Like Hell” and “Young Lust,” and ranks among the best-selling albums of all time alongside The Dark Side of the Moon, which both Pink Floyd and Waters solo have previously performed start to finish. Following Pink Floyd’s short-but-epic run of The Wall in 1980-81, which was documented on the live album Is There Anybody Out There?, Waters performed the double LP one more time as a solo artist in 1990 in Germany to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. Twenty years later, he’ll do it again during a 35-date trek that launches September 15th at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre.

“Thirty years ago when I wrote The Wall, I was a frightened young man,” Waters told Spinner. “It took me a long time to get over my fears. In the intervening years it has occurred to me that maybe the story of my fear and loss with its concomitant inevitable residue of ridicule, shame and punishment, provides an allegory for broader concerns: Nationalism, racism, sexism, religion, whatever! All these issues and ‘isms are driven by the same fears that drove my young life.”

Roger Waters’ official Website will relaunch today at 2 p.m. ET, perhaps with ticket onsale info. Until then, check out Waters’ The Wall dates below:

Roger Waters
Sept. 15 – Toronto, ON @ Air Canada Centre
Sept. 20 – Chicago, IL @ United Center
Sept. 21 – Chicago, IL @ United Center
Sept. 26 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Consol Energy Center
Sept. 28 – Cleveland, OH @ Quicken Loans Arena
Sept. 30 – Boston, MA @ TD Garden
Oct. 5 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
Oct. 8 – Buffalo, NY @ HSBC Arena
Oct. 10 – Washington, DC @ Verizon Center
Oct. 12 – Uniondale, NY @ Nassau Coliseum
Oct. 15 – Hartford, CT @ XL Center
Oct. 17 – Ottawa, ON @ ScotiaBank Place
Oct. 19 – Montreal, QC @ Bell Centre
Oct. 22 – Columbus, OH @ Schottenstein Center
Oct. 24 – Detroit, MI @ Palace of Auburn Hills
Oct. 26 – Omaha, NE @ Qwest Center
Oct. 27 – St Paul, MN @ Xcel Energy Center
Oct. 29 – St. Louis, MO @ Scottrade Center
Oct. 30 – Kansas City, MO @ Sprint Center
Nov. 3 – New York, NY @ Izod Center
Nov. 8 – Philadelphia, PA @ Wachovia Center
Nov. 9 – Philadelphia, PA @ Wachovia Center
Nov. 13 – Fort Lauderdale, FL @ Bank Atlantic Center
Nov. 16 – Tampa, FL @ St. Pete Times Forum
Nov. 18 – Atlanta, GA @ Philips Arena
Nov. 20 – Houston, TX @ Toyota Center
Nov. 21 – Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
Nov. 23 – Denver, CO @ Pepsi Center
Nov. 26 – Las Vegas, NV @ MGM Grand Garden Arena
Nov. 27 – Phoenix, AZ @ US Airways Center
Nov. 29 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Forum
Dec. 6 – San Jose, CA @ HP Pavilion
Dec. 10 – Vancouver, BC @ General Motors Place
Dec. 11 – Tacoma, WA @ Tacoma Dome
Dec. 13 – Anaheim, CA @ Honda Center

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Photo: Michael Ochs Archive/Getty
Pink Floyd have won their lawsuit over single-song downloads against EMI, effectively halting the digital sale of the band’s individual tracks. As Rolling Stone reported yesterday, under the terms of a 1999 contract that predated iTunes and other digital-music retailers, the band mandated its songs could not be offered outside the context of their original albums. EMI argued that the contract only covered physical and not digital releases. In the end, the judge sided with preserving Pink Floyd’s artistic vision, the BBC reports.

Check out Rolling Stone’s collection of Pink Floyd photos.

The judge also ordered EMI to pay roughly $60,000 for the band’s legal fees immediately while the court determines how much the label, to which Floyd signed in 1967, should pay in fines and damages. Also at issue: how much money Pink Floyd should receive in digital royalties, because the 1999 contract did not foresee the advent of downloadable music. Millions of dollars could be at stake; only the Beatles’ back catalog is more profitable than Pink Floyd’s.

With the ruling, it’s now last call for fans who want to legally download “The Narrow Way, Pt. 3″ without investing in the rest of Ummagumma, since at press time both iTunes and the Amazon MP3 store were still offering up Pink Floyd’s tracks as single song downloads. Expect this to change in the near future.

Related Stories:

• Pink Floyd Sue EMI Over Single Song Downloads
• Pink Floyd Sue EMI Over Royalties
• The Magic and Majesty of Pink Floyd

The members of Pink Floyd have reunited, but unfortunately it’s just to sue their label EMI. At the heart of the battle is Pink Floyd’s 1999 contract that indicated the band’s songs could not be isolated and sold outside the context of their original albums. However, on iTunes, EMI is offering all the Pink Floyd songs as a la carte purchases in addition to the full album bundles, prompting this latest lawsuit, the Guardian reports. EMI argues that the band’s clause about separating the songs only applies to their physical releases, and as it predates digital music services like iTunes, the clause doesn’t apply to the band’s downloadable discography.

In the lawsuit’s first hearing, which the band themselves didn’t attend, their lawyer Robert Howe argued, “Pink Floyd [are] well-known for performing seamless pieces. Many of the songs blend into each other,” adding that the 1999 contract “expressly prohibits” taking the songs out of context, which they allege EMI’s allowance of a la carte song purchases allows. Pink Floyd holds the label’s second most profitable back catalog behind only the Beatles.

This latest suit marks the second time in as many years that Pink Floyd and EMI have butted heads in a court of law: As Rolling Stone reported last April, the band sued EMI after accusing the label of significantly miscalculating their royalties. Pink Floyd initially signed with EMI in 1967 before moving to Columbia for their U.S. distribution for 1975’s Wish You Were Here. The group’s Columbia output was later reissued under EMI’s Capitol Records arm.

Related Stories:

• Pink Floyd Sue EMI Over Royalties
• <Pink Floyd Founding Member Rick Wright Dead at 65
• <The Magic and Majesty of Pink Floyd

Brian May Hints At Queen on Rock Band
Brainy guitar man Brian May says that there may be a Queen version of the popular video game Rock Band at some point in the future.
"Yes we’re into it, I think it may happen," May said regarding the subject during a BBC interview.
Pink Floyd’s Gilmour To Receive Honorary [...]

Source: Real Rock News

Classic Rock Briefs For October 14, 2009

Not everyone is easing into the digital age without a fight. Downloading music has been going on for years, some of it legitimate (think iTunes), but the bulk of it most likely not. Between torrents, file sharing sites and peer-to-peer, networks, one can presume that just about any album or track you can think of [...]

Source: Real Rock News

Musicians Divided Over Music Downloads