Roger Waters has collated six songs recorded and shared during the Covid-19 lockdown and released them on a new album, The Lockdown Sessions.
The album features recorded-at-home takes on five Pink Floyd songs, Mother and Vera from 1979’s The Wall, Two Suns in the Sunset and The Gunners Dream from 1983's The Final Cut, plus his recently-released new 'dark' version of Comfortably Numb. The album also includes Waters' solo track The Bravery Of Being Out Of Range, which originally featured on his 1992 album Amused To Death.
Waters previously shared each of these tracks with fans via YouTube or social media.
The 79-year-old musician revealed the existence of the album during a recent interview on The Grayzone podcast.
“There will be an album coming out," he said. "A new album called The Lockdown Sessions. I’ve given all these things away. They’re all out there, anybody can find them on the internet.”
In a press statement about the album, Waters comments: “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 Encores'. 'Yeah, has a nice ring to it!' Then…I’m in England doing the Ginger Baker tribute gig one Tuesday night at the Hammersmith Odeon with Eric Clapton and…the following Saturday marching from The Australian Embassy to Parliament Square to make a speech in support of Julian Assange, when bugger me, Covid…Schlummmm! For me it was Friday March 13th 2020. Lockdown! So much for the 'Encores' project. Unless…
We’ve tacked C. Numb on the end of the collection, as an appropriate exclamation point in closing this circle of love.”
In his Grayzone interview, Waters also revealed that he has begun work on a new studio album, pivoting around a new track called The Bar, which has featured on all but one show on his on-going This Is Not a Drill tour.
Waters returns to UK concert halls in 2023, for a three-date mini-tour: he will play Birmingham on May 31 at the Utilita Arena, before moving on to Glasgow’s OVO Hydro on June 2 and closing out his UK tour at London’s The O2 on June 6.
Talking up the tour, Waters says, “This Is Not A Drill is a groundbreaking new rock and roll/cinematic extravaganza, performed in the round, it is a stunning indictment of the corporate dystopia in which we all struggle to survive, and a call to action to Love, Protect and Share our precious and precarious planet home.
“The show includes a dozen great songs from Pink Floyd’s Golden Era alongside several new ones, words and music, same writer, same heart, same soul, the same man. Could be his last hurrah. Wow! My first farewell tour! Don’t miss it."
Listen to The Lockdown Sessions below.
