The Countertop Chronicles

For a Pink Floyd fan, David Gilmore has just given Rolling Stone a pretty brutally honest assessment of where the band is.

The inevitable question: The last I heard, you were speaking of Live 8 as perhaps the end of the story of Pink Floyd. What’s your current thoughts on the subject?
What I’ve been doing for the last couple of years — what I was in the middle of when Live 8 came along — was my album, and that’s what I’m thinking about. It’s been a joy and very satisfying, and the album did very well, even though Rolling Stone only gave it two stars. Everything went so well, I can’t see why I would want to be going back to that old thing. It’s very retrogressive. I want to look forward, and looking back isn’t my joy. Roger hasn’t written a lyric lately that has really been something where I’ve gone, “Wow, I wish that was part of my oeuvre.” I don’t know how one puts it, but going back into all that just wouldn’t bring me joy. It’s my time of life to be selfish — please myself.

You could do it without Roger again.
Yeah, yeah. One could do that. But again, I can’t really see why I would want to, unless I wanted a big boost for my ego or a big boost for my bank account, neither of which I need that badly.

They offer you outrageous sums of money to do this.
They did, yeah.

It must be strange to say, “No, I’m not taking that enormous sum of money.”
I can’t — it’s a very hard thing to discuss, really. To you and to virtually everyone in the public, they would find that a difficult thing to understand, because believe me, when I was impoverished, I wouldn’t have turned it down so easily. Life has dealt me a pretty fair hand, I’ve done very well, I’ve been very, very lucky, and now I can say, “This isn’t what I want to do.” As they say, every man has his price, and maybe that’s true, but whatever we’ve been offered isn’t mine.

Have you spoken to Roger since Live 8?
Yeah. Yes, I have. He called me up about something a little while ago. It’s nice. Of course, he was rehearsing. In the documentary that goes with the DVD, there’s a moment of me saying hi to Roger, where we were rehearsing, at Bray Studios near London at the same time last year.

So there’s been a little bit of a thaw?
Yeah. We’re not calling each other every week and going out for dinner every week, but the week of Live 8, we went out for dinner a couple of times. It’s a bit more reasonable. I think there are fundamental differences of opinion and view. As Roger likes to say, we are musically, philosophically, and politically different.

As a Beatles fan, there was something Lennon and McCartney could do together that they couldn’t do apart. Are you willing to accept that that’s true of you and Roger — and yet still not do it?
Yeah, I am willing to accept that. I know that art should be about everything, and therefore, one should get over all one’s differences to create art. But I suspect that our conjunction of people and musicality and taste and intelligence has run out of steam. Roger thought it had in 1975. Certainly, I don’t have any particular desire for it. What one is willing to sacrifice for one’s art is another whole point, and that’s beyond that I’m willing to do right at the moment.

Childhood’s End
Lyrics by David Gilmore

You shout in your sleep.
Perhaps the price is just too steep.
Is your conscience at rest
If once put to the test?

You awake with a start
To just the beating of your heart.
Just one man beneath the sky,
Just two ears, just two eyes.

You set sail across the sea
Of long past thoughts and memories.
Childhood’s end, your fantasies
Merge with harsh realities.

And then as the sail is hoist,
You find your eyes are growing moist.
All the fears never voiced
Say you have to make your final choice.

Who are you and who am I
To say we know the reason why?
Some are born; some men die
Beneath one infinite sky.

There’ll be war, there’ll be peace.
But everything one day will cease.
All the iron turned to rust;
All the proud men turned to dust.

And so all things, time will mend.
So this song will end.