David Gilmour Quotes

1. Jimi Hendrix isn't as good as me!  

2. The expectation on me as a solo artist is very different to the audience's expectation of a Pink Floyd show.

3. I'm not keener on paying tax than anyone else, but my freedom's not for sale.

4. After "Dark Side" we were really floundering around. I wanted to make the next album more musical, because I felt some of these tracks had been just vehicles for the words. We were working in 1974 in this horrible little rehearsal room in Kings Cross without windows, putting together what became the next two albums, "Wish You Were Here", and "Animals".

5. I've had a fantastic time making "On an Island" and really want to perform tracks from it, along with my more familiar repertoire.


6. Mortality has been on my mind since I was thirteen.

7. (about the band, in "Dark Side of the Moon Sessions") Obviously, they're all a gang of idiots. But, you know…live and let live. 

8. I do really think it is about as good a piece of work as I have ever done.

9. (on Roger Waters) He had developed his own limited, or very simple style. He was never very keen on improving himself as a bass player and half the time I would play bass on the records because I would tend to do it quicker. Right back to those early records; I mean, at least half the bass on all recorded output is me anyway…Rog used to come in and say: "Thank you very much" to me once in a while for winning him bass-playing polls. 

10. My technique is laughable at times. I have developed a style of my own, I suppose, which creeps around...I don't have to have too much technique for it. I've developed the parts of my technique that are useful to me. I'll never be a very fast guitar player. I don't really know what to say about my style. There's always a melodic intent in there. 

11. (on Syd Barrett) Syd's story is a sad story romanticized by people who don't know anything about it. They've made it fashionable but it's just not that way.

12. I'm very relieved not to be carrying the burden around, the big snail shell. Because it sometimes does feel like a big weight. The pressure of expectation is just too big. The whole Pink Floyd name, carting it around...I don't want to be there at the moment.

13. I don't have a very disciplined approach to practicing or anything, but I do tend to have a guitar around most of the time, which I strum on most of the day.

14. It's a powerful thing, this old Pink Floyd business. Look at all the stories that followed Live 8 - "Will they get back together? Will they tour together?" It's all so mysterious.



15. I just play intuitively and work the same way in the studio. I don't have any magical effects or anything that helps me to get my particular sound.

16. For me, "Wish You Were Here" was very satisfying. I'd rather listen to it than "Dark Side Of The Moon". I think we achieved a better balance of music and lyrics. "Dark Side" went a bit too far the other way - too much importance was placed on the lyrics. And sometimes the tunes were neglected.


17. Everything in moderation - that's what I live by. I'm just not a tortured, frustrated person who has to pour all these things out of his soul. None of that is a prerequisite to being good at rock 'n' roll.

18. It's nice to be loved and for one's contribution to be recognized in some way. I suppose I agree that we have had an influence on modern popular music.



19. I had a fantastic time. We hadn't played as Pink Floyd in 10 years and hadn't played with Roger in 25. The main thing was obviously the cause, but I was also pleased to get some of that personal, trivial antipathy that's been part of our lives for so long and pack that away. For several days, Roger and I went out together. I'm very pleased that we're now at a point where we can talk.

20. The period after "Dark Side of the Moon" when we made "Wish You Were Here" was a strange time. We had achieved everything really that one could hope to achieve. There was a bit of a distance between us all at that point, and Roger wasn't the only one who noticed this sense of absence. But that sense of absence is part of the album's magic. It helped create it. I don't know quite how it did. I can't regret that period at all.

21. A little girl came up to me the other day and said: "Do you live here?" I have a great staff that helps me run the place, but I really love being out on the floor, helping people stock shelves and talking to customers.

22. (on Roger Waters) I wish Roger absolutely well. But I can't imagine doing more than a one-off with him and the other guys at this point. It's been such a joyful experience working with the team I have now; nothing could make me happier than the situation I'm in. I'm extremely lucky.

23. I've been in The Who, I've been in The Beatles and I've been in Pink Floyd! Top that!


24. It's an atheistic song, you could say, about how people live on in your dreams and your memories. And that's the only place I can meet up with these people. It's a very sad thing, remembered with joy.

25. I don't want to be a full-time member of Pink Floyd all my life.

26. I'm an atheist, and I don't have any belief in an afterlife. You could say that I'm resigned to the fact that this wonderful life that we get here is it. And having hit 60, it's a good time to get resigned to these things and not be too nervous or upset - and enjoy what great times one can have.


27. (about the feud with Roger Waters) I'm not very good at holding grudges for very long, but he's done some terrible things.

28. I don't like to get too specific about lyrics. It places limitations on them, and spoils the listeners' interpretation.

29. Like most people I want to do everything I can to persuade the G8 leaders to make huge commitments to the relief of poverty and increased aid to the third world.

30. I had a great party for my 50th birthday, and I'm having a nice little one this time. But it's sad how many people aren't going to be there, because they've died in the intervening years. There's been a lot of carnage around me, and I'm sort of looking at that list.

31. It's crazy that America gives such a paltry percentage of its GNP to the starving nations. 








32. Yes, there's a lot of the blues in my playing.

33. It's a very tempting thing to try and relive your glory days when you get a little older and you worry that people have forgotten all about you.

34. I think I could walk into any music shop anywhere and with a guitar off the rack, a couple of basic pedals and an amp I could sound just like me. There's no devices, customized or otherwise, that give me my sound.

35. I don't even think whether I play the blues or not, I just play whatever feels right at the moment. I also will use any gadget or device that I find that helps me achieve the sort of sound on the guitar that I want to get.

36. I've never had any religion. I'd prefer it if I did, really. Even as a boy I just couldn't make myself believe.

37. I mean, I have moments of huge frustration because of my inability to express myself linguistically as clearly as I would like to.


38. (on Roger Waters) Roger doesn't have the right at present to tell me what to do with my life, although he believes that he does. And he'll not ruin my career, although lately he's been trying to.

39. I am a lover of all sorts of different music. I love blues and every piece of music that I have listened to has become an influence.

40. Usually, in the studio, on this sort of thing…you just go out and have a play over it, and see what comes, and it's usually - mostly - the first take that's the best one, and you find yourself repeating yourself thereafter.

41. I actually learned the guitar with the help of a Pete Seeger instructional record when I was 13 or 14.

42. If people would like to come to my concerts I'd love them to come. And if they like the music that I make, I love that too. But I do not make music for other people. I make it to please myself.

43. I had some criticisms of "Dark Side of the Moon". It's kind of ludicrous in a way to have criticisms of an album that was so successful but I did voice them at the time. I thought that one or two of the vehicles carrying the ideas were not as strong as the ideas that they carried. I thought we should try and work harder on marrying the idea and the vehicle that carried it, so that they both had an equal magic, or whatever, to them. So it's something I was personally pushing when we made "Wish You Were Here". It's underrated by some, but not by me. I think it's our most complete album.

44. Our music has depth, and attempts philosophical thought and meaning with discussions of infinity, eternity and mortality. There is a line which people cross that turns it into some magical, mystical realm, for which I don't claim responsibility and don't hold any great truck with.

45. Well, I am David Gilmour, the voice and guitar of Pink Floyd. I have been since I was 21.

46. Noone can replace Richard Wright - he was my musical partner and my friend. In the welter of arguments about who or what was Pink Floyd, Rick's enormous input was frequently forgotten. He was gentle, unassuming and private but his soulful voice and playing were vital, magical components of our most recognized Pink Floyd sound.

47. Any squabble Roger and the band have had in the past are so petty in this context, and if re-forming for this concert will help focus attention, then it's got to be worthwhile.



48. The band? It's over. Reunited because of the good cause (Live 8), to get over the bad relationship, and not to have regrets.

49. Where would rock and roll be without feedback?






50. All grocery stores used to be closed on Sunday…There's the sane world and the insane world - I choose to live in the sane world.


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