Tribute to Richard Wright, a true gem in the Pink Floyd line-up

Pink Floyd, an English progressive rock band, were one of the very few bands that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Not only they achieved remarkable accomplishments, the English rock band are also one of the most
commercially successful and influential bands of all time.

The Band originally consisted of students Roger Waters (lead vocals, bass guitar), Nick Mason (drums, percussions), Richard Wright (keyboards, organ, piano) and Syd Barrett (lead guitars, lead vocals), when they started playing together in London’s underground
music in 1965. David Gilmour (lead guitars, lead vocals) joined the band in December 1967, when the band had already launched a successful album ‘The Piper at the Gates of Dawn’.

Barrett departed from the band due to mental health in January 1968 and Waters became the Band’s lyricist and conceptual leader while Gilmour commanded on music compositions. With the new line-up, Pink Floyd attained worldwide critical and commercial success
and released 13 full-length studio albums.

Many believe that Gilmour’s soothing guitar sound with delicate string bends and slides that made his playing style unique to many others, always remained the embossing element in the Band’s music. However, in my opinion, Wright’s mesmerising and richly
textured keyboard layers were one of the vital ingredients in distinguishing Pink Floyd’s sound from its peers.

Wright was a prominent musical source in the early days of Pink Floyd, not as much as Barrett. He wrote and sang several songs, but became less interested in song writing as the band evolved, shifting his focus on contributing his distinctive style to extended
musical compositions.

He also made fundamental contributions to Pink Floyd’s long and epic compositions such as Echoes, Atom mother Heart and Shine On You Crazy Diamond. However, his most commercially successful compositions were ‘The Great Gig in the Sky’ and ‘Us and Them’ in
the album, The Dark Side of the Moon.

Wright not only achieved success while performing with Pink Floyd, but also earned fame though two of his solo albums, Wet Dream and Broken China released in 1978 and 1996 respectively.

Nonetheless, his contributions in Pink Floyd will always remain unmatched. The ghostly atmospheric textures, the echoed Farfisa Organ, the distinctive Minimoog (monophonic analog synthesizer) solos and the Wurlitzer passages are some of his expertise that
distinguished him from his counterparts like Jon Lord.

Wright died at the age of 65 due to an undisclosed form of cancer in his UK home on September 15, 2008. His band mates Gilmour, Waters and Mason, all expressed deep grief and sorrow on his death and expressed that none other can replace Wright.

Although the great pianist is no more with us today, his legacy still lives through his heart moulding compositions.

Remember a day before today
A day when you were young
Free to play alone with time
Evening never came… (Richard Wright 1943-2008)

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Posted by Haris Ansari on Nov 3 2011. Filed under Entertainment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry