DAVID GILMOUR

Strangely enough, the most overwrought track of all is the best of all. The vocals in Until We Sleep have that touching hypnotic dreamlike Gilmour quality trademark. The music is a slightly electronic sounding mid-paced drone that doesn't sound like anything he tried before. Take away the 80's production gloss and Gilmour could have made an entrancing 10 minute repetitive kraut trip out of this. The actual result stays far from that potential though.

The other decent moments consist of overstated blues ballads such as Murder, Out of The Blue and Near The End. But nothing can guarantee that you will be able to sit through these dragging songs without falling asleep. The remainder of the album is commercial low-quality pop such as Love On The Air, Blue Light, All Lovers Are Deranged.

Aboutface is a very disappointing album from Gilmour. A few songs and some solos aside there's not much here that will satisfy anybody but ardent Gilmour fans.

The first half of the album is very Floyd-like. With lush orchestrations, and lead by Gilmour's tasteful guitar and soothing vocals, the album often resembles the early nineteen seventies Pink Floyd (their best period). And while not bad, the second have tends to tail away, both in energy and in arrangements, with the songs getting more and more relaxed toward the end. This may be by design, as the album is called On An Island, and Gilmour may be going toward a sense of deepening relaxation as the album goes on.

I like it.

My favorite tracks are Mihalis, There's no way out of Here and Raise my Rent. And really, the only big difference I find between this album and the Pink Floyd albums from around that time is the lack of Roger Waters' sound effects experiments. In fact, I like it better than any of Waters' solo albums.

Murder, Blue Light and All Lovers Are Deranged (a great title, by the way) all have merit as songs, however un-prog they may be (although much of Pink Floyd's output isn't really prog either, in my opinion). And Out Of The Blue sounds to me to be very much like On The Turning Away.

Not great, but probably essential to a Floyd fanatic.

2.5 stars, rounded up.

AFAIK, this is to be the last release that Rick Wright played before his untimely passing away, so it was not without a certain shiver I took this DVD home from the library. While refusing to reform Floyd, (possibly avoiding some possible bad blood with Waters), Gilmour took care of Wright's envy of Floyd by taking him on the road while promoting his latest solo album, the very soporific On An Island, which makes the second bulk of the set list, after the Floyd material. And while the potential emotional charge is enormous (the stellar cast), the over-emphasis of such a mediocre album such OAI is not able to fulfil the promised excitement, precisely because of the boring sleep-inducing average songwriting. I was hoping that these would gain from getting a live exposition, but was cruelly deceived, despite some good Gilmourian solos.

Probably attracting more glances from the public than his role would allow him, Wright plays a very nice second fiddle, certainly more visible than Manzanera (despite hiding all the wayto the left stage), who is also playing second guitar to David. With the now-standard Dick Parry on sax (soon to be playing second sax behind David, since Gilmour made his coming out on Red Sky), other familiar names such as Pratt and Carin are regulars? After a first DSOTM run opening the concert, the set plunges in the OIA album with some moments of graces (the odd brilliant solo, the star-studded guest list) and some complete flops (some songs, David playing the banjo, even Wyatt's fine cornet solo during a boring song). Once in a while, one can ask himself if David really needs that many musicians on stage for the amount of decibels delivered and notes played. Soooo after an exciting start, the first set comes to a close with another snoozer and the intermission is a welcome wake-up call to fill the glasses.

The second set is almost entirely Floyd stuff and opens on the amazing Crazy Diamond, but unfortunately, it isn't that good, despite the return of Crosby and Nash on back up vocals and Dick's Parrytone sax solo, etc? If most Floyd tracks go down easy, Echoes is the real attention grabber, where both Rick and David probably had fun trading those lines at the end of part one. Played in its entirety and followed up with the track WYWH (how come Roy Harper didn't show up to this gig for a cigar?), the night finally gets emotional, but it's a little late, although the end with Bowie's appearance in the all-too obvious (but excellent) Comfortably Numb adds some more emotions. No encore, apparently.

The second disc gives us a bunch of other tracks at the same venue, but another day, and this includes an Arnold Layne with Wright singing for Barrett, a cool rockumentary about the tour, some of the tour's other dates extracts and plenty more "bonus stuff" that is not called as such. Certainly immensely more enjoyable than the previous Gilmour DVD (the acoustic tour), I seem to enjoy more the throw-it-all-in disc's first part rather than the concert disc, which has this huge

This brings me to two conclusions. The first one is that not one singular person of PF can be credited for the exceptional quality of the band: the sum of the four forces together was infinitely higher then the sum of its parts.

However, a second conclusion is that David Gilmour is sure the aspect of Floyd's sound that appeals the most to me, both his cool understated vocals and his extraordinary guitar skills connect with me on a very emotional level. His music just gets to me. Similar to Andy Latimer, he's the kind of guitar player that always needs just a few notes. But it always are the right notes in the exact spot where they should be.

These days it's common practice to be a bit condescending against Gilmour. I often hear criticisms that he is all empty pathos, devoid of feeling, lacking intensity and substance. Well, I agree that his ensuing solo albums are drowsy affairs, but I really can't see how these criticisms could possibly apply to the mesmerizing melancholic beauty of this album here.

I regard this as an essential solo album from David Gilmour. It doesn't come near anything prog so I will leave it dangling at 4 stars, but it's a very smooth and moody Gilmour-blues affair that boasts strong songs, great guitar work and his ever-charming vocals.

It's difficult for me to decide, who could be interested in this album, may be just heavy PF maniacs-collectors. Haveng a few good moments, in many places that album is difficult for listening!

P.S. Pink Floyd researchers will find there some characteristic sounds and structures Gilmour will use later in after-Waters Pink Floyd albums.

Album contains mid-tempo guitar based blues rock with many guitar sounds, pleasant in melodies in arrangements. Few instrumentals as well. Almost all songs are better than average, and few are good.

Gilmour blues-rock is coming not from dirty black US-roots, isn't it and classic british blues rock ( in vein of John Mayall). Gilmour is using blues rock structures and sounds, mixing tham with some PF characteristic signs, and all that are cooked as pop-rock dish.

All in all, album is pleasant for listening, but perfectly demonstrates, who is the main person in PF ( for sure, not Gilmour). If you're interested in more Floydian solo work, just take Rick Wright's "Wet Dreams".

But now, finally, there is a worthy follow up to the Pink Floyd live heritage from the early 70's. David Gilmour got him self surrounded by his buddy Richard Wright and a nice selection of musicians that make the big PF sound come alive again but manage to avoid the high levels of hollow pomposity that DSoT and Pulse suffered from. Also Gilmour's voice sounds more hoarse and passionate then it ever was.

It starts off with a small selection of songs from Dark Side of the Moon. Too bad they didn't do the entire album with this group, as the versions of Breathe and Time here are the best I've ever heard. Alas, that pretty much sums up CD1 for me. I thought Gilmour's last studio album quite the snooze fest and the live renditions of those songs haven't convinced me otherwise yet. It's no problem really, there's another disk crammed with Floyd classics!

So, flash forward 10 songs and we have the first of the 2 surprises that makes this set essential for me. Sure, we all have heard about 15 live versions of Shine On Your Crazy Diamond already but here this song finally works for me. Really, I had always enjoyed the instrumental bits of it but never liked the vocal lines all that much. Here, Gilmour takes an entirely different approach to the verses and chorus and it does magic. This is it, much more intimate and genuine, this is Shine On as it always should have been. Perfect.

The second treat is of course Echoes, not that the remainder of the set isn't excellent but because we can finally enjoy a live rendition of this masterpiece again. Apart from the Pompeï version, which stayed close to the studio version, I have only heard 2 disappointing performances (sound wise) from bootleg recordings. One from 1972 and one from the 1987 tour. But here it is and it is astounding. Not all that different from the original but still a few new touches left and right. Especially the ending section is very nice.

Next to Umma Gumma, this is the second live from the Floyd (yes it says David Gilmour on the cover but do you really miss Nick Mason here?) that is absolutely essential in my opinion. However, until Gilmour's solo tracks have grown on me, this will have to do with 4 stars.