

On Friday night, Roger Waters performed Pink Floyd’s The Wall at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas (Photo: © Erik Kabik/ RETNA/ www.erikkabik.com).

Our thanks to Las Vegas photographer Erik Kabik for this report and photos.

Photo: © Erik Kabik/ RETNA/ www.erikkabik.com.

This show was a presentation of epic proportions. Roger Waters has brought back the Floyd masterpiece The Wall for a 2nd tour (the last and first tour was in 1980-1981 with his band Pink Floyd) and tonight’s show in Vegas was the 30th of a 36 show North American Tour Water’s is calling his Farewell Tour and celebration of The Wall’s 30th anniversary.

Waters has performed The Wall only one time since 1981 in Berlin, Germany in 1990, to commemorate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The new version of the 2010 Wall show featured many of the original theatrics and monumental stage sets and props from the original tour with an injection of new technology making it a state of the art presentation in concert sound and visuals. The sound in MGM Grand Garden was absolutely perfect and music and sound effects surrounded the audience from all directions throughout.

Tonights performance of Waters’ masterpiece, which he wrote while with Pink Floyd, took fans on a journey through the madness, addictions and struggles of the fictional character named Pink, loosely based on Waters’ himself. The album was born out of Water’s own isolation, dissolution and lifelong fears.

Waters and the band performed all 4 sides of the album and fans watched as the wall slowly went up brick by brick finally concealing the entire band behind the wall by the end of set 1. The Wall spanned across the entire MGM Garden Arena and the band returned to perform the bulk of the 2nd set behind the wall. Water’s laced the performance with modern themes and political and social messages making the show more topical for a modern audience and addressing issues he found important to share with his audience. Water’s addressed the crowd at the end of the show after the Wall was torn down in an explosive finale. He spoke about when he wrote The Wall 30 years ago, and how he was in a different state of mind, frightened and isolated, but today he is a brighter more cheerful man and seems at peace with his place in life and he said how much he loved being on stage and being there with his fans.

If this is in fact his farewell tour, as he has stated, then it’s quite an extraordinary exit he is making. Die hard Pink Floyd fans are still hopeful and waiting for him and David Gilmour to reunite one more time with drummer Nick Mason for a Pink Floyd tour… but it’s unlikely and this is perhaps the final chapter for live Pink Floyd music. It’s up to David Gilmour now. — Erik Kabik