David Gilmore

Born March 6, 1946, Cambridge

The band was named Pink Floyd in honor of blues' musicians Pinkney 'Pink' Anderson and Floyd Council. At 13, he was given a Spanish guitar by a neighbor and so the journey began. As the band’s primary singer-guitarist Syd Barrett provided Pink Floyd with most of its original early material. Barrett’s elfin, tuneful psychedelia made him the Lewis Carroll
of the pop scene. Intense experimentation with LSD unfortunately transported Barrett from enlightenment to mental instability, and increasingly unpredictable behavior necessitated his departure from Pink Floyd in 1968, leaving the primary song-writing duties to Roger Waters. The band at this point was comprised of Roger Waters, vocals and bass; Nick Mason, drums; and Richard Wright on keyboards, and David Gilmour as a fill in on guitar.

Their 1973 album Dark Side of the Moon took them from the fringes of psychedelic rock and put them on the top of the charts. The album went on to become one of the best selling records of all time, spending more than 25 years on Billboard's Top 200 chart. They had further success with Wish You Were Here (1975), Animals (1977) and The Wall, which sold more than 20 million copies (1979), Pink Floyd released 17 non compilation albums, but by the '80s the band drifted apart.

In the winter of 1979, Producer Bob Ezrin took the master tapes for the song “Comfortably Numb” with him to New York and recorded a full orchestra. When he played them for Gilmore, he absolutely hated them. Gilmore was insistent that the song be stripped down. They eventually compromised and “Comfortably Numb” was released with full orchestration for the first half and guitar as the dominant instrument for the second half.

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All star salute to David Gillmore