Few bands have a single hit, let alone albums’ worth of all-time great material. For many Pink Floyd fans, Comfortably Numb is the jewel in the crown. The Wall hit is still found in the favour of both David Gilmour and Roger Waters in their live shows. It’s one of the band’s most-listened-to songs, and yet it’s this very version from The Wall which has so little to offer. An all-time great, without question, but it’s not the studio version that is the definitive version. Far from it, in fact. A beautiful song all the same, a definitively perfect piece which established the band as a progressive rock outfit with arthouse attitudes. But it’s not Shine on You Crazy Diamond (Parts I – V) or Have a Cigar levels of perfection. The band would be far from that lofty Wish You Were Here height just two albums later. What The Wall lacks is not conviction, but performance.
Waters and Gilmour would give Comfortably Numb just that in their live performances, but the album version is a truly lacking experience. With or without the context of The Wall as a project, Comfortably Numb remains an all too quiet song. It sounds frightened of itself, as if a loud guitar inclusion or stronger tap of the drums would scare it out of place. Strange, since the song is not a delicate number. Comfortably Numb has improved on stage, be it with the band’s live album outputs or the recently released version of the song on This is Not a Drill. Even Gilmour’s usually beautiful guitar work sounds soft here. There is no doubting the brilliance of the writing, which is the focus and a detriment, too. A song which, like much of The Wall, works far better when performed with the adrenaline-pumping live experience. When a crowd is involved, it becomes so much better. The Wall remains underutilised, heavy-handed, and those softer moments like Comfortably Numb struggle to stand out.
Isolate the song, then, as the band did when they released it as a single. Comfortably Numb still struggles because of all the expected Pink Floyd hallmarks. Floaty writing, an instrumental section which makes A Momentary Lapse of Reason look restrained, and a fade-out which is the hallmark of laziness. A borderline criminal action from the band on a song which, be it through the Live 8 performance or genuine shock of seeing Gilmour and Waters play it together in 2011, rips the heart out of it. Take a look at that latter live version, right from The O2 performance, and you can get a glimpse of how great a song Comfortably Numb is. With the right tools, most of them visual, the song becomes a truly dominant force in their discography.
That is no knock at the band’s studio work. Other veterans of the stage, like Bob Dylan with When I Paint My Masterpiece, would find a better angle for the song live than in the studio. Some songs are made for the stage, and Comfortably Numb is just that. Nothing changes but the context and delivery. That makes all the difference, especially when those versions are so easily accessed. Van Morrison and The Band delivered a beautiful version of the song, while Gilmour would improve the soft-sounding guitar solo over the decades. Comfortably Numb is a magnificent piece of work, one which relies on the strength of those beautifully written moments. But those moments are only as strong as the context of listening, and for those who find The Wall to be an unconvincing project, they are better off looking elsewhere, for superior versions.
