In conjunction with the recent release of Roger Waters’ rerecorded “Redux” version of Pink Floyd’s classic The Dark Side of the Moon album, Waters has been answering a series of fan questions in video clips posted on his social media sites. In the latest Q&A segment, Waters reveals which Dark Side lyric continues to resonate the most with him.
Videos by American Songwriter
After reading the question, which actually asks what Dark Side lyric resonates with Waters more now than when he wrote it, the 80-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Famer takes several seconds to ponder the query. He then comments, “I’ve obviously looked at them all in remaking this record recently.”
Waters Reveals the Lyric
Waters then recites a lyric from the song “Breathe”: “All that you touch, and all that you see are all your life will ever be.” However, he initially misidentifies the line as being from “Eclipse,” the song that ends The Dark Side of the Moon.
“‘Breathe’ … is at the beginning of the record, and isn’t reiterated,” Waters then notes, “but [the two songs are] bookends to the same idea.”
A Lengthy Explanation of the Lyric’s Meaning
The singer, songwriter, and bassist goes on to give a lengthy, tangential explanation of what the lyric means.
“Pay attention. You only get one go at this. Try and make the most of it,” he says. “You get more joy out of expressing your empathy and love for other human beings than you do from colonizing them and enslaving them and killing them and stealing from them and robbing them of their land and their life and their liberty, and all the other things that … colonialists do to their victims.”
He adds that the paraphrased meaning of the “Breathe” lyric is reflected in other songs “all the way through” the album, while noting, “it doesn’t mean more now than it did then. It means the same.”
Waters’ The Dark Side of the Moon Redux album was released in October. The album, which he recorded with his solo touring band, reached No. 4 on the British albums chart.
Waters’ New Song
Waters, of course, is a longtime advocate of the Palestinian people, and has been an outspoken critic of Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip that followed the Hamas terrorist organization’s attack on Israel in October 2023.
In an apparent response to Israel’s bombing of the Gaza Strip, Waters posted a video on his YouTube channel featuring a heart-wrenching new song called “Under the Rubble.”
The melancholy track features Waters emotively singing, “Papa, I want to go home now / Papa, please take me home / Mama, please tell me I’m dreaming / And I’ll wake up soon, and I won’t be alone / Mama, it’s dark here / Daddy’s stopped breathing / Mama, mama.”
