Roger Waters on opening night of his 2022 tour (Photo: Kate Izor; used with permission)
Roger Waters has announced the release of The Lockdown Sessions on June 2, 2023, on CD and vinyl. The collection of songs, originally available digitally on Dec. 9, 2022, were recorded and filmed at home during the Covid lockdown between 2020 and 2021. Also included with the release is “Comfortably Numb 2022” which was recorded during Waters “This Is Not A Drill” North American tour. The 1980 song, written by David Gilmour and Waters, originally appeared on the Pink Floyd album, The Wall. Watch several of the performances below.
Appearing on the recordings are Waters – Vocals; Gus Seyffert – Bass, Synth, Percussion, Vocals; Joey Waronker – Drums; Dave Kilminster – Vocals; Jonathan Wilson – Harmonium, Synth, Guitar and Vocals; Jon Carin – Synth, Vocals; Lucius (Jess Wolfe and Holly Laessig) – Vocals. The sessions were produced by Waters and Seyffert.
In the original Dec. 9 announcement, Waters said, “Our ‘Us and Them’ Tour lasted three years…At every gig we did an encore after the main show closed with ‘Comfortably Numb’…the encore was always ‘Mother’… I can’t remember why I decided to start doing other songs?…Anyway, at some point after the end of the tour…I started thinking, ‘It could make an interesting album, all those encores.'”
The Lockdown Sessions are five seminal tracks from Waters’ time with Pink Floyd and his solo career. Also included are “Vera” from Pink Floyd’s The Wall; “Two Suns in the Sunset” and “The Gunner’s Dream” from Waters’ final Pink Floyd album, The Final Cut; and “The Bravery of Being Out of Range” from his solo album, Amused to Death.
Waters added: “During Lockdown I made a demo of a new version of ‘Comfortably Numb‘ as an opener for our new show, ‘This Is Not A Drill.’ I pitched it a whole step down, in A Minor, to make it darker and arranged it with no solos, except over the outro chord sequence, where there is a heartrendingly beautiful female vocal solo from Shanay Johnson, one of our new singers.
“It’s intended as a wakeup call, and a bridge towards a kinder future with more talking to strangers, either in ‘The Bar’ or just ‘Passing in the Street’ and less slaughter ‘In Some Foreign Field’.”
The video, nearly nine minutes long, was produced and directed by Sean Evans; photography is by Kate Izor.
[Also appearing on the track are Amanda Belair – Vocals; and Nigel Godrich – Strings, amp and backing vocals from Roger Waters The Wall Sessions.]
Waters’ “This Is Not a Drill” is touring Europe in 2023 with shows across 14 European countries. It’s currently set to continue through June 10. Tickets are available here and here.
Related: Our recap of opening night of Waters’ “This Is Not a Drill” tour
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3 Comments so far
Jump into a conversationit was brilliant way to start the concert, it gave us a modern, without david gilmour version and a Gig in the sky vocal moment, great show.
Saw him in Salt Lake City in September. This is a great video, but being there and not expecting this opening to the concert was absolutely amazing! The best production I’ve ever experienced!
I’ve seen Roger about 5 times. and this last time the show was horrendous. I will take the original version anytime. I am going to concerts to escape the political atmosphere around us