Remember When: Rick Wright Quietly Departed Pink Floyd in 1979

To the outside world, Pink Floyd was rolling along like an unstoppable juggernaut throughout the 70s. Because of their tendency to eschew the spotlight as individual members, no one could have guessed there was much turmoil behind the scenes.

Videos by American Songwriter

As a result, when one of their core members left the band, few fans even realized it. That’s how it all went down with keyboardist Rick Wright in 1979.

Wright’s Rise and Fall

Rick Wright helped define the sound of Pink Floyd’s greatest 70s successes. His ambient organ, piano, and synthesizer work and his soothing vocals, both on lead and in harmonies, proved integral. But Roger Waters, who largely determined the band’s artistic direction, started to feel that Wright wasn’t getting the job done.

Since Pink Floyd diligently shielded the band’s inner workings from the public, most of this tumult happened behind the scenes. But by the time Waters was putting together his massive concept album The Wall, he largely left Wright out of the creative process.

Truth be told, drummer Nick Mason also struggled to find his footing on the project. Instead, Waters relied mostly upon guitarist David Gilmour (with whom he also struggled to get along) and Bob Ezrin, who came aboard as the album’s co-producer, to help him shepherd the project to its realization.

A Silent Farewell

It’s hard to determine who was at fault in Nick Wright’s departure from Pink Floyd. Accounts of the principles differ. Waters contended that Wright wasn’t doing his share. He felt the keyboardist preferred to stay in his Mediterranean home rather than get down and dirty in the sessions.

Others claimed that nothing Wright did in the studio could please Waters. In Waters’ defense, Gilmour, at the time, agreed with Waters’ assessment. While Wright’s playing can be found on The Wall album, some of the most prominent parts were handled by Ezrin.

At one point, Waters allegedly threatened to shelve the entire project as a kind of ultimatum to get Wright to leave the group. Since the band needed the album to prop up their finances, which had been depleted by ill-advised investments, Wright relented. He agreed to leave as an official member of the group. But he wasn’t quite out of the Floyd’s orbit.

The Aftermath

To keep the press and the fans’ focus on the album and not the drama, Pink Floyd made no official announcement of Wright’s departure. Instead, they hired him as a contract player for the resulting tour. That actually benefitted Wright from a financial standpoint. Costs for the tour, assumed by the three official members, were so high that none of the trio made money from it. Wright, paid as a hired hand, came out in the black.

Most of the world discovered Wright’s absence from the band in 1983, when The Final Cut, Floyd’s next album, arrived. That’s when only Waters, Gilmour, and Mason were listed as members of the group.

Wright returned to Floyd, still as a contract player, to play on a few songs on the 1987 album A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, the band’s first after Waters left. By the release of The Division Bell seven years later, he had regained his status as an official member of the band.

Photo by Jorgen Angel/Redferns