The Wall – Live in Berlin

The Wall – Live in Berlinwas a live concert performance byRoger Watersand numerous guest artists, of thePink Floydstudio albumThe Wall, itself largely written by Waters during his time with the band. The show was held inBerlinon 21 July 1990, to commemorate thefallof theBerlin Walleight months earlier. Alive albumof the concert was released in September 1990. Avideoof the concert was also commercially released.
The concert was staged on vacant terrain betweenPotsdamer Platzand theBrandenburg Gate, a location that was part of the former "no man's land" of the Berlin Wall.
"I did an interview a couple of years ago for a guy calledRedbeard…" Waters recalled. "He said, 'Would you ever performThe Wallagain on stage?' And I said, 'No'… Indoors, it made no sense financially; it's too expensive. And, as it's partially an attack on the inherently greedy nature of stadium rock shows, it would be wrong to do it in stadiums… I said, 'Well, I might do it outdoors if they ever take thewall down in Berlin.'… The Memorial Fund was in a council meeting, and felt they needed some kind of an event to focus attention on it… So I agreed to have a meeting withLeonard Cheshire. And I was very impressed, and said I would do what I could, although I thought it was very unlikely that it would come off… Then, in November [1989], when the wall started coming down, we started negotiating."
The event was produced and cast by Britishimpresarioand producerTony Hollingsworth. It was staged partly at Waters' expense. While he subsequently earned the money back from the sale of the CD and video releases of the album, the original plan was to donate all profits past his initial investment to the Memorial Fund for Disaster Relief, a UK charity founded byLeonard Cheshire. However, audio and video sales came in significantly under projections, and the trading arm of the charity (Operation Dinghy) incurred heavy losses.A few years later, the charity was wound up, and the audio and video sales rights from the concert performance returned to Waters.
The production was designed byMark Fisherand Jonathan Park.The stage design featured a 550-foot-long (170 m) and 82-foot-high (25 m) wall. Most of the wall was built before the show and the rest was built progressively through the first part of the show. The wall was then knocked down at the end of the show.
Waters tried to get guests likePeter Gabriel,Bruce SpringsteenandEric Claptonbut they were either unavailable or turned it down.Rod Stewart, who was to sing "Young Lust", andJoe Cockerwere confirmed but, when the planned concert date was put back, both were unavailable."To sell the idea to TV, I had to get people to commit themselves and it very nearly killed me," Waters recalled. "The likes ofJoni MitchellandBryan Adamswere prepared to say 'Yes' from the start, but there were so many others who were just waiting to see who else was involved before they made up their minds."
In the 1989 interview with Redbeard, Waters stated, "I might even letDaveplay guitar."On 30 June 1990 – during an interview before Pink Floyd's performance atKnebworth'90 – Gilmour responded to Roger's statement on an interview withKurt Loderon MTV by saying that he "and the rest of Pink Floyd (Nick MasonandRick Wright) had been given the legal go-ahead to perform with Roger but had not been contacted" and "he never asked us" (in a fake crying voice) with Nick Mason saying "if only that phone can ring".Two days later, on 2 July 1990 Waters appeared on the American rock radio call-in showRocklineand contradicted his Gilmour invite by saying, "I don't know where Dave got that idea".
In the end, Hollingsworth (with Waters assisting) brought in guest artists includingSnowy White,Rick Danko,Levon HelmandGarth HudsonofThe Band,The Hooters,Van Morrison,Sinéad O'Connor,Cyndi Lauper,Marianne Faithfull,Scorpions, Joni Mitchell,Paul Carrack,Thomas Dolbyand Bryan Adams, along with actorsAlbert Finney,Jerry Hall,Tim CurryandUte Lemper. Leonard Cheshire opened the concert by blowing a World War I whistle.
This performance had several differences from Pink Floyd's original production ofThe Wallshow. Both "Mother" and "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II" (like in the 1980/81 concerts) were extended with solos by various instruments and the latter had a cold ending. "In The Flesh" (also like the 1980/81 concerts) has an extended intro, and "Comfortably Numb" featured dueling solos by the two guitarists as well as an additional chorus at the end of the song. "The Show Must Go On" is omitted completely, while both "The Last Few Bricks" and "What Shall We Do Now?" are included. Also, the performance of the song "The Trial" had live actors playing the parts, with Thomas Dolby playing the part of the teacher hanging from the wall, Tim Curry as the prosecutor and Albert Finney as the Judge. The repeated proclamation of "Tear down the wall!" and subsequent destruction of the on-stage wall was for this show accompanied by a projection of a section of the actual Berlin Wall on the styrofoam bricks used on stage. The show officially ended with "The Tide Is Turning", a song from Waters' then-recent solo albumRadio K.A.O.S.The Wall's original closing number, "Outside the Wall," was affixed to the end of "The Tide is Turning."
The Wall – Live in Berlinwas released as a live recording of the concert, and theLaserdiscvideo inNTSCcan still be found through second sourcing. A DVD was released in 2003 in the U.S. by Island/Mercury Records and internationally by Universal Music (Region-free).
Hollingsworth's company Tribute, a London-based "good causes" campaign company, sold worldwide television rights, with 52 countries showing the two-hour event. Twenty countries showed up to five repeats of the show and 65 countries broadcast a highlights show. There was also distribution of a double music CD and post-production VHS videotape byPolyGram.
All tracks written or co-written byRoger Waters.
Tracks9,14,21, and23, co-written byDavid Gilmour.
Track26, co-written byBob Ezrin.