Released some two years after the concert was recorded, David Gilmour’s Live in Gdansk has two events at play that add to the simple evaluation of the performance. It was performed at the same location that Lech Walesa organized a movement against the oppressive Communist faction in 1980 (Solidarity) and the album hit stores just one week after Richard Wright passed away. With new strains rising in Russia, anti-Communist history echoes louder than before. And Wright, a founding member of Pink Floyd, played keyboards for Gdansk, making this something of a swan song for him. These elevated footnotes add an oddly affecting gravity to a performance that verges on the ethereal—floating through space with the soundtrack of the old gods, if you will.
Live in Gdansk is, as one would expect, an epic recording. Two-and-a-half hours in length, with a rich sound that only dozens of musicians on stage could make. Joining Gilmour is Wright, guitarist Phil Manzanera (Roxy Music), bassist Guy Pratt (Killing Joke), keyboardist Jon Carin, saxophonist Dick Parry, drummer Steve DiStanislao and the Baltic Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra. But the music never feels overstuffed; there are no walls of dense Spector-esque soup to keep us at a distance. Gilmour and his electrifying guitar would have been enough to captivate an audience, but the other musicians add understated but effective support. In particular, Manzanera joins Gilmour for some intertwining and cohesive guitar arrangements that slow dance with each other quite provocatively.
The set opens with some Floyd heavies—“Speak to Me,” “Breathe” (and its reprise) and “Time”—material heard so many times before by so many people that live versions are about the only way to make them truly register as unique art anymore. Gilmour’s vocalizing lacks the unearthly grandeur found on Dark Side of the Moon, but also gives these tracks an interesting gravitas. It’s haggard and workman-like, making the songs much more human than alien. But the music is so beloved and timeless that nothing short of broken notes and atonal squawking would have sunk it.
After the nostalgia trip, we venture into Gilmour’s solo work. The next ten tracks come from 2006’s On an Island, arguably his most refined and unfailing non-Floyd venture. Oddly, all of the tracks proceed in order except one: “Take a Breath” has been shifted from clean-up to the seventh spot. While it doesn’t break up the musical flow (like swapping tracks on a live Tommy set would), it’s still a peculiar choice. Normally, Floyd fanatics might deem this near-hour-long section to be a beer-buying/bathroom break down spot, like when dinosaur acts dip into their new album after playing six radio hits in a row. But this is a Gilmour show, not a reunion, and these songs sound fresher for not being radio classics. Gilmour’s searing guitar breathes life into the title track and “The Blue,” a pair of atmospheric space rockers. “This Heaven” is a nice break from the outer space blues, bringing in an acoustic guitar and a slow swing groove—the R&B flavor that marked much of Floyd’s 70s “real” songs. “Then I Close My Eyes” is a country-fried folk rocker (there’s even a banjo) given a psychedelic jazz shine—perhaps to prove that it’s still Gilmour who’s in charge. Rounding off the Island material is “Where We Start,” a somber, lounge-lite number pushed to epic extremes.
The second disc is all Floyd, a mix of classics and curios. Gilmour probably trotted out Division Bell cuts “High Hopes” and “A Great Day for Freedom” to represent the band post-Roger Waters, but neither one will ever compete with the group’s work in the 70s. The biggest highlights come at either end: “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” and “Comfortably Numb”; the former for its dramatic crescendos beefed up by the orchestra and Manzanera’s extra muscle, the latter simply because it’s still one of the greatest rock songs ever recorded. In between, “Fat Old Sun” and “Wish You Were Here” add rustic charms with grounded acoustic twang and “Astronomy Domine” is always a superstar on stage, far more frightfully evocative than the Piper version ever could have been. “Echoes,” just like the Meddle version, is simply too long, but has more than its share of shining moments to pass by a couple of times.
There’s no doubt that this live set will attract attention from Floyd fans that have never spun a Gilmour solo effort before, but it’s still a great shame that only Island was represented from his catalog. A David Gilmour live show without “Blue Light” and “There’s No Way Out of Here” is like a Sting concert that only features Police tunes. “I Can’t Breathe Anymore” would have been a welcome addition, too, as would “Until We Sleep.” But then again, I would've loved to have heard “Brain Damage/Eclipse,” “If,” “Sheep,” and “One of These Days” as well. Complaining about what’s missing in a live set is futile, but the absence of Gilmour’s individual material is a lot more frustrating in context than whether or not the Stones will run through “Midnight Rambler.”
What matters is whether or not they put on a good show. On that count, they bring down the house. Even the few less-than-stellar songs are beautifully performed. Gilmour is the star here, but every musician (including the forty-piece string section of the orchestra) has a chance to shine. And for all the burden that the back-story might have caused this record because of timing, venue, etc., all of it disappears when the music rolls out of the speakers. A mix of hazy psychedelia and theatrical rock, Live in Gdansk may not be an essential live recording, but deserves a place in the collection of any fan of Gilmour, even if their familiarity comes solely from dusty vinyl copies of Dark Side and The Wall.
"Live in Gdansk" is on sale September 22, 2008 from Columbia.
