Search - Pink Floyd :: Is There Anybody Out There

Pink Floyd's arguable masterpiece is bettered in concert

Terrence J. Reardon | Lake Worth (a west Palm Beach suburb), FL | 03/05/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Pink Floyd's Is There Anybody Out There?: The Wall Live was released in April of 2000 on EMI in most of the world sans the US and Canada which was released on Columbia Records.

The album was released to commemorate the 20th anniversary of The Wall. The album was originally slated for release in late 1999 but producer James Guthrie (who co-produced the original studio album with Pink Floyd members Roger Waters and David Gilmour and legendary rock producer Bob Ezrin) had to bake the master tapes to get the sticky glue off after sitting in storage for years. Also, the band had problems with their US record companies. The band had just inked a new distribution deal with Capitol/EMI worldwide and were set to release but Columbia/Sony in the US and Canada were initially against the album but reluctantly agreed to release the album as the band's final album with Sony in the US and Canada after the band switched labels which were licensed the music (the band have the final say on what gets released and not released and this review is for the EMI edition which has some different images in the booklet than the US issue).

Is There Anybody Out There? was recorded at London's Earls Court Arena during the band's performances of The Wall in August of 1980 and June of 1981, the shows were a bona fide spectacle. More than anything, Is There Anybody Out There? captures the volume, the bombast and the grandeur of these famed performances with remarkable accuracy.

These performances are astonishingly faithful to the band's studio versions although the band does get to stretch out on "In the Flesh (pt. 1)", "The Thin Ice", "Another Brick in the Wall (pt.1)", "Another Brick in the Wall (pt. 2)", "Mother", "Goodbye Blue Sky", "Young Lust", "Hey You", "Comfortably Numb", "The Show Must Go On", "In the Flesh (pt.2)", "Run Like Hell" and "Outside the Wall" with either extra guitar solos from David Gilmour showing why he is one of rock's greatest guitarists or extra keyboard solos from the late Rick Wright (God rest his soul) or extra verses or extended musical pieces.

The other tracks "Empty Spaces", "One of My Turns", "Don't Leave Me Now", "Another Brick in the Wall (pt. 3)", "Is There Anybody Out There?", "Nobody Home", "Vera", "Bring the Boys Back Home", "Waiting For the Worms", "Stop!" and "The Trial" trumps its studio counterparts although remained faithful to them.

Although they were kicked out in 1979 and 1982 respectively by Roger Waters due to his uncontrollable ego, co-founders keyboard player/songwriter (the sadly departed) Rick Wright and drummer Nick Mason played better on this live album than on the studio version of The Wall, especially Rick whose Hammond Organ and keyboard work buries that of its studio counterpart. Roger Waters didn't play much bass on this live album as he perfectly recreated the role of Pink and left Andy Bown to play bass in his place. David Gilmour's musical arrangements and guitar and vocals were superb as well as always.

"Run Like Hell" is classic with Roger Waters' classic intro.

This live Wall album also includes two unreleased tracks. "What Shall We Do Now" was left off the original release due to space constraints and "The Last Few Bricks" was a reprise of "Happiest Days", "Young Lust" and "Empty Spaces" as an instrumental for wall builders to catch up to the band.

Also, longtime Floyd album cover guru Storm Thorgerson's artwork of the four Floyd member face masks is striking and the booklets has recollections from the four Floyd members plus road crew and stage designers with some cool pictures of the band performing this work live.

This live album did well for a "from the vault" release hitting #19 on the album charts and #1 on the Internet Album Sales chart and went Platinum in a month of its release here in the States. This live album has zero overdubs and is one of the best live albums I ever heard next to Pink Floyd's Pulse, Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains the Same 2-CD reissue, Rush's Different Stages, Queen's Queen Rock Montreal, Genesis' Seconds Out and Genesis' Live Over Europe, The Who's Live at Leeds and Supertramp's Paris among many others.

Highly recommended!"