Roger Waters says he has never regretted leaving Pink Floyd, even when playing to ‘half-empty arenas’

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There was not “one single second” Roger Waters regretted leaving Pink Floyd, the bassist and songwriter has confirmed.

The Wall hitmaker would leave the group he founded with Syd Barrett in 1985. Though the band would continue for nine years after his departure, and would play much larger venues than Waters’ solo shows, the music veteran says he has never regretted his decision. Even during a low point in his solo career, Waters believes his solo career has been far more satisfying than playing to the 80,000-strong crowds Pink Floyd could attract. Part of the problem, Waters believes, is that some fans cannot “understand the difference” between The Dark Side of the Moon and The Division Bell. Despite the much smaller crowds, Waters considered himself a Henry V figure, and was happy with the “band of brothers” in “half-empty arenas.”

Speaking to Word Magazine, Waters says he appreciated the smaller shows and had no regrets about his departure from the band. He said: “Not for one single second. There were times… like when I was in Cincinnati and I was playing to a half-empty arena, 3,000 people in a 6,000-capacity venue, and Pink Floyd were playing to 80,000 people the next night – this was the Radio Kaos tour, it was 1987. 

“I felt like Henry the Fifth, ‘We happy few, we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother’, meaning that because there are only a few of them there, it is sweeter. Because of the camaraderie. And there was definitely that feeling from the 3,000 people that were there.”

Though Waters would go on to say his departure made very little difference to those wanting to see Pink Floyd live, he suggested they were getting a lesser experience. The David Gilmour-fronted line-up of Pink Floyd would tour up to 1994, when the guitarist decided to call it quits.

Waters added: “I felt a huge kind of kinship with them. And I felt that the 80,000 people the next night were not, you know, getting it. It was a cobbled-together facsimile of the work I used to do, and they would probably never understand that they were being short-changed. 

“And they still are. There’s still quite a large number of people who don’t understand the difference between The Dark Side of the Moon and The Division Bell. They can’t tell one from the other. They don’t get it!”

Waters would later confirm he, Gilmour, Nick Mason, and Richard Wright, were offered $250million to tour as Pink Floyd following their Live 8 reunion. The band would ultimately turn this offer down, and as of 2025, has still not performed together since their twenty-minute charity showcase.

The bassist said: “The day they announced the Pink Floyd were to play Live 8, I went out to dinner with a friend and an offer arrived – literally bang on the dinner table – for the four of us, the Pink Floyd, to tour again. An offer of $250 million. Guaranteed.”

Waters did not reveal why the offer was turned down but it may have something to do with the lack of a charitable angle associated with the performance. The bassist has toured as a solo artist in the years since Pink Floyd’s Live 8 reunion, as has Gilmour.