Roger Waters Live Last Night in Glendale,AZ

Roger has always been political. If you didn't go for the whole package, you're not understanding him. Not his fault if you're an a la carte fan.

Roger has a lot of issues. He is very wealthy and could probably do a lot of good for a lot of people, but he’d rather rant about what other people should do from the stage while he makes even more money. It doesn’t make sense to me, but that’s life as a Rock Star.

He is unbearable to me. Period. I wouldn't make him one cent richer. He's nowhere near as brilliant as he thinks he is, and he is absolutely tasteless to come to our country and criticize our history to paying customers. How could anyone but a supreme egotist think that an audience would be interested in what he thinks? 

   Poor Roger, he suffers from L.S.D. Also known as Lead Singers Disease. It’s a progressive and often terminal condition that occurs when the individual believes his B S matters.  It is very common amongst Rock vocalist and has crossed over to professional athletes as well. Others that show obvious symptoms are Ted Nugent and Sammy Hagar. As a paying fan, I go for the music not to hear someone’s social agenda. But unfortunately it comes with the territory. Pink Floyd is wrought with the horrors of the war and mental health issues and I’ve always appreciated their music. Many years ago I took my son to see Green Day American Idiot and it was laced with F Bombs and political ranting. But today my son just remembers that we had fun seeing one of his favorite bands. Regards, Mike B.  

I'd much rather see David Gilmour live than Roger Waters.

Linda Ronstadt gave a political rant while doing a show in Pahrump, Nevada. Only problem was she was in a military town. You have to know your audience. They trashed the theater, and she was banned from the place. 

I give artists a lot of slack with their ramblings during concerts, but I have my limits. I will walk out if a performer starts bashing my country in a non-stop rant.  

We did leave after an hour. Too loud for my old ears.

And we were a long ways up!

I'm a fan of Roger and his music, and I'm 100% in favor of him or any other artist saying whatever they want on stage, politically or otherwise.

While I've usually agreed with him on most things in the past, his more recent opinions have been real head-scratchers for me that I just do not understand. 

I missed him this time around, but I've missed everybody since 2020; haven't been going to gigs....

When U2's first album came out I bought it, loved it.Later they started their political we're right correct attitude. And even went as far as telling president Bush what to do at the oval office about the Ethiopia starvation famine. And telling BB King how to play "when love comes to town."Although i agree with they're politics They eventually fell out of favor with me so I stopped listening. I have my own ideas can think for myself examine other ideas and views for myself, I studied though not to a degree, philosophy.. I can remember a time when you listened to a band for the sheer joy of enjoyment of their music and lyrics, Not for what they believe in. And I won't spend that money on forced lesson. What happened to the fun?

Went to see Roger in Edmonton a couple weeks back.  Bad sound and terrible stage layout for everyone that didn't pay $300+ for line-of-sight seats.  As for all his political B.S., it's getting really tiresome.  If Roger wants me to take his views seriously, than he would sit down for a debate with some scholars in the field.  Otherwise keep this in mind.  The bums in the seats that paid for the tickets, represent the Organ Grinder.  Roger, you represent The Monkey.  Know thy place and sing your songs.  That's what we came to hear.  IMHO

@noromance

"Roger has always been political. If you didn’t go for the whole package, you’re not understanding him."

Completely agree.

@bigtwin

Otherwise keep this in mind. The bums in the seats that paid for the tickets, represent the Organ Grinder. Roger, you represent The Monkey.

Completely disagree.

I doubt whether Waters ever saw himself as a mere entertainer. Whether you like his opinions or not, just like Morrissey, Roger Waters regards himself as an artist

He was never one of those short sighted idiot entertainers who tried to drop the odd populist slogan for self gain. Waters has tried to debate with scholars and has tried to think things through.

Although I applaud his candour I would tend to disagree with his outlook but then I’ve not had his upbringing.

Taken from Wikipedia -

His father, the son of a coal miner and Labour Party activist, was a schoolteacher, a devout Christian, and a Communist Party member.^[3]

In the early years of the Second World War, Waters’s father was a conscientious objector who drove an ambulance during the Blitz.^[3] He later changed his stance on pacifism, joined the Territorial Army and was commissioned into the 8th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers as a Second Lieutenant on 11 September 1943.^[4] He was killed five months later on 18 February 1944 at Aprilia, during the Battle of Anzio, when Roger was five months old.

@noromance  We are entitled to our own opinions.  And that's what make this a wonderful forum.  As for Roger's upbringing, I don't see that it gives him any special insights.  Lot's of kids grow up without a father around. 

Last time I saw him was a Wall show, and it was boring.  

Everyone is welcome to their opinion, but I don't want to pay to hear or see it.

Waters has been heavily in politics for a long time. Nothing new. His last masterpiece was amused to death, heavily aimed at the Chinese government for running that girl over with a tank in Tiananman Square. After that he sadly basically lost any kind of balance between politics and music. To me art and politics don't match. In fact Hendrix dying before he was fully engrossed in the political direction he was following ends up being a good thing for my love of his music. Politics are all about material matters, music and art in general are just the opposite.

While I certainly don’t agree with all of his opinions and sometimes he is just over the top, his interview with Dan Rather on Axs TV ( all excellent interviews with rock and country stars) showed that he is very bright and very articulate. I found the interview to be very refreshing from an intellectual standpoint. The interview is available on the internet although not on you tube.

Type in google search bar: axs tv  Dan Rather interview with Roger Waters

He did the same thing here in Edmonton AB  a few weeks ago. It's bad enough paying ridiculous prices, but having to sit there and listen to blah blah...blah blah...

Pink Floyd is one of my favorite bands. I have all of their albums since Dark Side of the Moon. I once had a girlfriend who bitterly complained that I played "Wish you Were Here" over and over. I also enjoyed Rogers' solo albums.  Politically he is a total jerk IMO.   His anti-Israel beliefs nauseate me.  In that regard, he is just another **ick in the Wall.  I can still enjoy his music while I hold my nose.

While his music has had a social commentary aspect going back to Dark Side, he seems to have gone off the rails with age. He now supports the People's Republic Of China crushing the free and democratic people of the country of Taiwan.  He supports full surrender of Ukraine to Russia.  His positions have gotten quite demented.

Go see Nick Mason or David Gilmour if you want a live Floyd fix.

When I saw him a few weeks ago, they had a recording before the show even started that said something along the lines of, if you came just for the music and not his politics, you can eff off to the bar. 

You had your chance. 

I should have done some research before buying the tickets.

I knew he used Q Sound in the early 90s so I thought he must appreciate

good sound.  

If Travlinjack and Styleman's statements are correct Roger is not playing with a full

deck.

As people age they often become more paranoid.

He did look good for 79!

@baylinor 

I completely agree with your comment concerning Jimi Hendrix. I think that things were going to go downhill shortly, and I'm so glad that I didn't have to witness that.

I’m not interested in hearing from artists and actors regarding politics, religion, or economics. 

Isn’t the idea to write SONGS that speak to issues that you care about and through MUSIC move people to agree and take action?

I’m not interested in hearing from artists and actors regarding politics, religion, or economics.

How dare they have opinions and/or causes they believe in promoting. As dodgealum states, the history of song writing is packed with songs speaking to these three topics as an artists expression of their opinion/belief.

Artists are going to say what's on their mind.

I walked out of a U2 concert after the third song for same reason. I like the music and thought I was paying to hear and see a “music show” not a political lecture from a rich activist. I think this all stems from their marketing firms they hire. They convince them that they need to be controversial to remain relevant and attract new fringe fans. Doing right for people in an Anonymous way no longer happens. They need to have their ego stroked and praise heaped on them for the cause they pick. Truth be they have the money to help make the change but the want to project on to everyone else as they rake in millions and live a life style out of reach for all of us. This is the current time we live in where every “celebrity” is being marketed by activists and no longer let their music do the talking but use their status to talk down or at people instead of talking to them! I can even say that as much as I like their music I will no longer listen to or support them for who they have become! There is so much great music out there to enjoy without the bs and the lecture I have moved on from them to never look back!

Quite proud of how the local administration of my city, Krakow, handled this situation with Roger Waters. He was supposed to play here a couple of weeks ago, but he has been declared as "persona non grata", so he just cannot play anymore. People who bought the tickets preferred to trash them instead of hearing his bullshits about Russia, Putin and the ugly U.S.

At least in Poland you can't do that in this historical moment.

Thanks Poland.

I don’t think that anyone’s comments here are going to change a single poster’s mind on anything.

Even though we, as individuals, would like it to. No matter where we be coming from. That we all, individually, are trying to do our best, in what we feel is integrity and some semblance of humane thinking and caring, with the information we individually have, or think we have. The key bit. Think we have.

The longer a problem exists, the more fundamental the errors in the formulation of the question. And this problem has been standing for 30 years in it’s current form (1992), 70 years in it’s longer form (1945) and hundreds of years in it’s long tailed detailed form (1776, etc). It can take many paths, though, as it’s threads go all over the world and down multitudes of complex lines. A hundred books, nay, a thousand books could be written - and have been.

Each of us have to ask ourselves what mistakes we’ve made in the formulation of our questions and thus answers to what is in front of us, in this thread.

I have a VERY strong, well researched, well edujmacated opinion on all that is said here in this thread. And can debate anyone here nose to nose and not lose an inch of ground... I’d take yards and yards of ground. For days on end. (ego statement, or simple logic derived fact?) (foolish to say, as people are emotionally reactive?)

But... if no one is listening.. where many would just be angry and reactive and not be doing the the same, in egoless integrity (which is a tall order for anyone!) (ie, research, learn, grow, change) then I’d just get beaten to death by the illiteracy of the crowd. (perhaps we each feel the same)

So, sadly, it’s best to stay home and let the animal aspects of the projections of the given mind get out there and beat each other to death in the streets, as that is where they/we/you/me/us are headed, regardless if I spill my blood on/in it.

Those who are looking at this thread and not posting, tend to have an opinion that resembles that sort of thinking.

We (any of us here) want to share and maybe help and maybe move things forward, but how to address the aspects of people who are deep in their cups of self reinforcement and projection? Am I misinformed? Is it you? Is it all of us?

We’re now at the burning spear end of the illiterate thrusting of the purposely directed and misinformed masses in all areas and regions, and the intellectual debate in integrity and actual facts and true data will happen afterward, IF we can all manage to find one.

Sorry if this rambles for a bit, but I am very passionate about this subject.

I founded YOUniteUSA about 5 years ago. The initial goal was to identify, validate and celebrate our common links and connections. I developed the "Connections Pyramid" that looks something like this. From top to bottom (relative to group size) are: YOU, followed by "Heartstrings" (those we love) follow by "Shared Indulgences" (music, sports, cars, hobbies, wine, food, etc), then "Navigating Complexity" (going about our daily business while being in sync with others during our daily commute, Starbucks stop, etc) then, at the bottom (and largest group) "Everybody Else". I also formulated from this that our quality of life is dependant on those we’ll never see, or meet, and HALF those people have ideologies that are in direct oppostiion to our own. I also developed the inverted pyramid that (you guessed it) is upside down and illustrates where we put our attention -- mostly on US.

"Shared indulgences" includes live concerts. So, at 9:03PM the band/performer is introduced. At that point in time 100% of the audience is fully engaged, resonating as a group at the same frenquency. They all love the performer, and thrilled to share experience and energy with those who embrace the same passion for the genre, group, or solo entertainer as they do. They also hope that the performer shares thet same afinity for THEM as they do for the artist. Then, at 9:04 PM, the performer makes a statement that many in the group do not agree with. Let’s just estimate the group size at 20,000, then round this off to 1/2 of the group that didn’t appreciate the messaging. So, in a moment’s time, 10k people know the following: a) they don’t like the performer as much as they did a minute ago, b) the realize the performer doesn’t like them, c) they don’t like the person next to them who chanted approval of the message, and d) the person next to them thinks less of them because they "booed" the performer -- AND the message.

This is referred to as "disruptive marketing" whereby messages or actions are introduced without the consent of the participant in a way that they are unavoidable. These range from pop up ads, to the sticky notes on newspaper or magazine covers that we have to remove to get to the content we want. It’s a low level form of a ambush. Something we really don’t want/need thrust on us that disrupts the activity we are involved in. While no one gets physically hurt, the distraction from "the thing" can range from minor irritation to totally ruining an experience -- expecially those we were highly emotionally and financially vested in.

There’s another term I call "The Exodus of Authenticity." It seems that we are pulling away from things that are genuine and becoming more accustomed to substitutes for those things -- even virually representations of them. We’re also giving others permission to insert other agendas into "the thing", diluting the experience, sometimes to the degree where the other agenda dominates the experience. If we were out for a nice dinner, we wouldn’t be receptive of the server bringing out our meal accompanied by a 3-minute rant about their view of the world even IF it agreed with ours. If we disagreed with those points, we might have just handed the propriertor the death sentence for any future engagement. In other words, a dinner out IS a dinner out, Not a event where the experience is dimished by "others" attempts to impose their will on ours. The authenticity SHOULD remain intact. If the server persisted after being warned by their boss, they’d be repremanded, or even terminated for not following company guidelines.

Our society is held together by fine threads of cooperation and sanity. Like a suspension bridge, the support cables that keep them intact are made up of many smaller cables. If one small element of that cable is (intentionally) severed, it may takes centuries for catastrophic failure to occur. But, today we’re employing "Weapons of Mass Division" -- taking a laser cutter to mutiple strainds. Politicians who never stop campaigning top the list (followed by problems we don’t want solved). Those whose fame allows them to reach large audiences are a contributors to the Mass Division that I am referring to. Tens of thousands of smiling, wildly enthusiatic people who were "one" for a brief moment in time are insulted, rejected and turned against each other because a person, desperate for relevance, needs his/her voice to be heard. It is selfish, immature, bad for business, and destructive to a sane and loving society.

They get away with becuase they can. They have a buffer -- enough financial headroom to take risks and the resources to disqualify hafl their audience (and, former admirers). When they take the stage, they are "at work". They "punched they timeclock" and peforming their duties on stage as a professional entertainer. But what about the "average guy" on the street? Would they have the same freedom of expression? What about a gay man who works at Barnes and Noble who wanders over to the Christian book section to explain the customers that their interpretation of the Bible is misguided? Or, the Scientogist who delivers pizza who want’s to slip promotional materials into the pizza boxes he/she delievers. In both cases, customer objections would be dealt with immediately and termination would be emenent if they did not comply. They have neither fame, leverage, or the financial headroom to demand that their messages by heard -- at work. Celebrity has its privileges. Voicing opinions that alienate half their audience, and cause division, is one of them.

The combination of audience alienation and diliution of "the thing" we came to enjoy is two strikes against being politically active "at work". Sure, they can do personal interviews in their own time, and the viewer can opt in, or opt out of participating. Or, better yet, use artistic expression to convey those messages (For What It’s Worth, Ohio, etc) and let the open market decide the value (monetary, artistically and socially) of the work. It would bring people together. Not tear them apart.

Johnny Youniteus

teo-audio:  wow, your picture should be next to the definition of long winded.

When I go to a concert I go to hear the music, not the political rantings of the musician.  The last three concerts I’ve been to had no politics at all (Eagles, Bob Seger, Bob Jovi), and enjoyed the hell out of all of them.  Saw Cyndi Lauper (sp?) and left when she started spewing her left wing liberal Democrat garbage.  Don’t want to hear conservatives either, just play your music, sing your songs, maybe an encore or two, then on to the next city, leaving the audience happy.

Do your political statements on your own time and dime, not on mine.  The NFL listened to the sound of money leaving their coffers, so non-support can and does work.

Although I am a huge Floyd fan, Waters is off limits. He has gotten increasingly louder in his rants but the final straw was when he said “America is the most evil country in the world”. Why would I pay to hear him spew his bullshit? You do not see David Gilmour or Nick Mason going on about politics, it should be kept at home. I will no longer spend my money to see him or buy anymore of his music. Waters is dead to me.  A big FY to Roger, well deserved. 

@anotherbob +1 long winded was being kind.

@cd318 + 1

Bass players are background material, always in need of attention. Guitar players get all the girls.

He seems to be pretty removed from facts:

I am also not a big fan of Pink Floyd. I know that no one cares, but that took care of my last comment for the day.

When I go to a concert I go to hear the music, not the political rantings of the musician.

When I go to a concert I go to hear the music and whatever else the artist has to say. They're not my juke box -- they're people.

teo-audio: wow, your picture should be next to the definition of long winded.

Maybe my middle name should have been ’Verbal’....

I wanted to say something to defend or shoot down roger (whatever floats your boat), but I figure that is a waste of time. So that is what I said. In so many words.....

Everyone should crack a smile, specially Waters, you'll live longer.

Roger Waters is an amazing musician .I attend concerts for the music,not to have somebody shove their political beliefs down my throat!

I attend concerts for the music,not to have somebody shove their political beliefs down my throat!

I guess we're different in this regard. No one is "shoving" anything. I can listen or ignore, agree or disagree. I'm resilient that way.

It always puzzles me why people like Roger always live in the countries they despise and are happy to take the money of the people of those countries. You’d think they wouldn’t want to dirty their hands with that filthy lucre. People like Roger never move to Russia or Cuba or Venezuela or China. There always seems to be a disconnect between their mouths and their actions.

"I guess we're different in this regard. No one is "shoving" anything. I can listen or ignore, agree or disagree. I'm resilient that way."

@hilde45 

That's true, but how many of us want to pay the current prices of concert tickets , with the expectation of being entertained only to spend 15% of that time listening to political hot air? You may not call it shoving, but they're a captive audience.

@roxy54 You make a good point. Perhaps some kind of disclaimer on the ticket -

- e.g. "During this 90 minute show, you will hear X minutes of music and Y minutes of the musicians talking."

That way, one would make an informed decision about what they're in for!

Huge Floyd fan here, but ZERO time for Roger Waters. To answer his "Is anybody listening?" question from The Wall, the big fat answer is "Not to you they are not."

If I would have had more time, I would have written a shorter memo.

@teo_audio Actually, I thought you said quite a bit in a few short sentences.

I think you’re playing dumb @hilde45.  People don’t object to musicians talking about the music or telling funny stories or jokes. These "Storyteller" type concerts are popular.

What people object to is being subjected to stupid and hypocritical political rants. People should be informed in ads that the rants will be a prominent feature of the show.