David Gilmour told Live Aid organisers “no” to a Pink Floyd reunion “several times” according to Roger Waters.
The bassist would eventually convince Gilmour to rejoin the band for a twenty-minute, one-off performance in 2005. Waters and Gilmour were joined by Nick Mason and Richard Wright, with their show for the charity event being the last of the classic line-up. Though Waters and Gilmour would tour separately following this show, sometimes with Mason in their line-up, the classic four-piece would not play together again. It very nearly didn’t happen, either, as Waters had to convince Gilmour to come back into the band after Bob Geldof failed to bring the veteran guitarist on board. Waters claimed he was the ‘only person’ who could convince his ex-bandmate to get back on stage with him, and he did just that with a phone call to Gilmour.
He shared in an interview with Radio Bogota: “Well, because he [Geldof] asked Dave and Dave said no. On several occasions… Well, because I was the only person who could have got Dave to do it.”
Though Waters may have convinced the Pink Floyd guitarist to join the line-up, it wouldn’t end that well for the band. Waters would later suggest Gilmour “regretted” taking part in the show as it meant it was Waters’ band once again. The bassist would leave the group in 1985, giving Gilmour nine years as frontman. Though there may be some regret from Gilmour, Waters has said he would happily get back on stage with Pink Floyd if it were possible.
Waters said: “No of course not. I’d do it in a heartbeat. I don’t think Dave wants to do it all. I think he sort of regretted Live 8 a bit, so who knows. Well because it was his band and suddenly it wasn’t any more.
“Suddenly this is what it was, this is the sort of thing it actually is – it’s Dave and Roger and Nick and Rick. And he said afterwards it would have been just the same if Roger hadn’t been there, but it’s not the same.”
Waters would say in several interviews around this time that he wanted to reform the band and also that he “regretted” the way things fell apart for the group on his departure in 1985. Speaking of his departure from the band in 2007, Waters said: “I don’t think any of us came out of the years from 1985 with any credit, really. It was a bad, negative time, really. And I regret my part in that negativity.
“I was actually more attached to the philosophy and politics of Pink Floyd than the others were — certainly more so than David was. In a way, whatever I did I did in a way to protect the integrity of what I saw as being important about the work that the four of us did together.
“I realise now that move was doomed to failure … and why should I have imposed my feelings about the work and what it was worth on the others if they didn’t feel the same? I was wrong in attempting to do that.”
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