Julie and I happened to be in England in 2006 for reasons I’ll explain in a couple of chapters, but this allowed me to get to see Roger Waters perform at Hyde Park Calling.
I’d purchased my ticket before I left Australia, and I also had some fun preparing signage and “not for sale merchandising” to take to the show. **
I had a T-shirt printed with the face from the cover of Relics and the slogan, “Roger Waters a RELIC you can dig”.
As you can see in the pic, I also made the Relics face into a face mask. I actually had a few of these, which I hung up on gates and fences after the show, hopefully for Floyd fans to grab and take home.
I found out later that Matt Johns from Brain Damage website was near me in the crowd and he remembers seeing the mask
and T-shirt.
(All photographs taken by me! Except the T-shirt one, obviously)
I made the sign depicted left and placed it on a fence to the left of the stage prior to Roger’s performance.
I watched as a concert goer read the sign, did a double-take, looked around, and then nicked it!
If that guy is reading this… Hey You! Prove it was you and you win a free Roger Waters a RELIC you can dig T-shirt.**
I’m not here to give a concert review. There are dozens of reviews of this show on other forums. But I have to say it was spectacular!
And it was made extra special because Nick Mason made a guest appearance, sharing drumming duties with Graham Broad.
Deep in concentration, Nick Mason appears on the big screen.
The highlight for me was the visuals and sound effects during On The Run. The train screaming across the screen, for example was so incredibly loud it felt like it ran right through me. It was the loudest thing I’d heard in my life until it was outdone just a few days later when, while driving through a mountainous area of Scotland two Harrier jets flew very low overhead. We’d actually started to pull over because we thought the car’s undercarriage was falling off and scraping along the road!
Three lowlights were Roger clearly lip-synching during The Fletcher Memorial Home; at one point Roger had a look on his face like he’d just been sprung badly. Sort of like, “Oops! You didn’t see that, did you?”
Nick Mason had a couple of featured drum parts, but aside from those his drumming was impossible to hear, like his mikes had been dumped. I listened REAL HARD and watched like a hawk but couldn’t hear him.
At the end of the show Roger called Nick forward and patted his belly. It was odd and clearly made Nick feel awkward. I caught it on video but unfortunately the footage is too blurry to show here, but it was weeeeiiirrrrd.
Above: Relics face masks hung up around Hyde Park after the show.
If anyone reading this grabbed one and can prove it, you win a free copy of Relics.**
(Interesting fact: The original album artwork was modeled on a photograph of John Cavanagh**)
**I also printed a mini poster advertising Roger’s show and placed a few around Hyde Park and in train
stations. At the bottom of the poster it said, “Proudly presented by LIPS INC.” I got that bit right!
** Lousy thief! You get nothin’! 🙂
** I’m serious!
** Not a fact