Pink Floyd : The Story of Wish You Were Here (2012)
Wish You Were Here, released in September 1975, was the follow up album to the globally successful The Dark Side Of The Moon and is cited by many fans, as well as band members Richard Wright and David Gilmour, as their favorite Pink Floyd album. On release it went straight to Number One in both the UK and the US and topped the charts in many other countries around the world. This program tells the story of the making of this landmark release through new interviews with Roger Waters, David Gilmour and Nick Mason and archive interviews with the late Richard Wright. Also featured are sleeve designer Storm Thorgerson, guest vocalist Roy Harper, front cover burning man Ronnie Rondell and others involved in the creation of the album. In addition, original recording engineer Brian Humphries revisits the master tapes at Abbey Road Studios to illustrate aspects of the songs construction.
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Reviews
Sick Product of a Sick System
Overrated and overhyped
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.
I idolized these musicians as a teenager, and decades later it's nice to see that these guys are indeed bright and sensitive people. We get a good feel for what they went through when Syd Barrett became mentally ill and what happened when he visited Abbey Road Studios 7 years later. The film also gives us insight into how they struggled to link the songs thematically; we learn how a few rifts from Gilmour's imagination inspired the others to finish composing the tracks; and we even get an interpretation of Wish You Were Here's lyrics. Every interview feels unscripted. When the sound manager walks into the studio, I think he really is walking in there for the fist time in a while.
Like spoken liner notes; the estranged musicians behind one of classic rock's best groups sit down to chat about the moods, conflicts and sounds that went into one of their seminal albums. Less technical than the preceding Making of The Dark Side of the Moon, it's more invested in uncovering the messages and meanings behind each track than the efforts that went into producing the finished sound. It still spends some time unraveling the aural onion skin behind an enormous mixing board, but Waters, Gilmour and company are caught in a more reflective, philosophical mood that delves into the recurring themes of the album, rather than the motions they were making with their hands. As usual, the band is anything but level-headed, but beyond their superficial egotism lies a dense, intellectual shared nature with plenty of wisdom and substantial meaning to share. They're smart, deep guys, but god are they in love with themselves. Nevertheless, it's bittersweet commentary on a bittersweet record, which speaks volumes (both directly and indirectly) about where the band had been and the dark clouds that were already forming on their horizon.
As a big fan of Pink Floyd as soon as I saw the release I was excited; I just finished watching it and I love it.What you will find here is:Recent new interviews with Roger Waters, David Gilmour and Nick Mason and some material from Richard Wright before he past and some pictures and archive footage of the Great Syd Barret.They talk about each song , what it means to them and how it was created ; also Brian Humphries (sound engineer of Wish you were Here) take us through the recording process and Storm Thorgerson talks about the cover and some of the art work.The band talks about the emotional moment in which Syd appear on Abbey road and at first they didn't recognize him and there's some acoustic playing and singing by Roger and Dave in their interviews.For the fans it will a nice experience. I'm Happy :=).