David Gilmour Royal Albert Hall Review ★★★★★

David Gilmour’s performance at the Royal Albert Hall on 10th October 2024 was much enjoyed by my girlfriend and me. We had decent tickets from the fan pre-sale which were a whopping £250 each after the usual Ticketmaster costs were loaded on top of the £227 ticket price. Because he was only doing a residency for 6 nights at the Royal Albert Hall in the UK, and no other nights closer to Liverpool or Manchester up North, this also meant a long weekend in London which was much enjoyed. Here is my David Gilmour Royal Albert Hall review. I last watched David Gilmour at the Royal Albert Hall on 24th September 2015 as part of the “Rattle That Lock” tour. So I was very excited to be watching him again, only this time with a ticket upgrade as you may be able to tell from my pictures.

This review contains the full set list of the David Gilmour tour, photos, videos and my reflections on the evening. To say there are spoilers is an understatement, quite frankly.

On the topic of pictures, it was quite a surprise to see Guy Pratt come out on stage by himself before the show began. He wanted to tell people not to use their phones during the concert to be filming, as it spoils the enjoyment of people behind me. The people behind me were blind drunk, screaming each time the Webb Sisters sang or were on the screen projector, and were even kicking me in the back, literally! I filmed some of the songs and took some pictures too, with my screen brightness turned right down and certainly no flash. Good advice, Guy. Anyway, the band were about ready to begin and they sounded fantastic.

The show opened with the instrumental piece “5am,” with a beautifully soaring guitar solo. This also opened the show back in 2015 when I heard the song live for the first time. I am glad David Gilmour picked the song again as it’s such a cinematic and atmospheric piece, it resets the brain from the hustle and bustle of the city and prepares you for the forthcoming. It really set the tone of the concert well. He then did “Black Cat,” an instrumental from the new album.

The next song, the first with lyrics, was also from the new album and was the title track, “Luck and Strange,” complete with his big sound from the Gibson guitar. Lovely tone. The band then visited three songs from “Dark Side of the Moon,” covering “Breathe (In the Air),” “Time,” and then “Breathe (Reprise).” The band was on top form and the lead vocal parts from guitarist and vocalist Ben Worsely were excellent. The chemistry between the two guitarists on stage was really nice to see. Because I had decent tickets and was practically on stage, I could see their smiles to each other during some rather epic and groovy playing together.

Then came the really nice surprise (well, not if you already saw the setlist from the Brighton warm-up gig) in the form of the ancient Pink Floyd song “Fat Old Sun.” It originally appeared on the 1970 album “Atom Heart Mother.” It was one of the first songs David Gilmour wrote. Each band member wrote a song on “Atom Heart Mother” on the second side, with the orchestral piece on side one being the title track of the album. Experimental. Anyway, “Fat Old Sun” sounded like it invented hard rock, which is attributable very much indeed to some of the early experimentation that Pink Floyd did. The song was very heavy, bringing out the best of the rhythm section with drummer Adam Betts building up a real groove with bassist Guy Pratt. The big heavy guitars of David Gilmour and Ben Worsley fattened the sound out and swelled even more with the dreamy tones of keyboards and organ from Greg Phillinganes and Rob Gentry. This song was a real standout selection from the colossal back catalogue that David had the pleasure to pick from. The massive projection of the sun on Mr Screens looked amazing too. Great lighting by the way, the LED strip lights created some amazing looking scenes and were blinding at points! Wonder what the electricity usage was like that night!

The first set continued with Pink Floyd’s “Marooned,” which has some very atmospheric scenes with the lead guitar guiding the way through the song, supported by some excellent keyboard tones. I thought of Rick Wright a lot at this point. We then had a nice laid-back rendition of “Wish You Were Here.” Again, the audience saw the excellent chemistry between the two guitarists. I had my “Wish You Were Here” T-shirt on, so felt very much part of the show! I thought about Syd Barrett, who the song was inspired by at this point. A very important note in my David Gilmour Royal Albert Hall review.

The first half then had a musical interlude “Vita Brevis” before Romany Gilmour took to the lead vocal of The Montgolfier Brothers’ song “Between Two Points.” Considering Romany had a baptism of fire at the Brighton Centre and Circo Massimo, she made the act of performing in front of the London crowd look effortless. This was not a bad karaoke performance of an old song down the pub. It was an expertly sung piece that flowed out effortlessly, much to the delight of the old Pink Floyd fans in the audience. Well done, Romany.

The first set concluded with the song “High Hopes,” one of my favourite songs from the later David Gilmour-led Pink Floyd era and a classic from the “Pulse” live video. Thank you very much indeed! There was a great twist to the show with the large white balls being unleashed onto the audience to interact with during the song. Some of them nearly made their way onto the stage at ay points and the poor crew looked a bit frustrated trying to get them back off the audience! But a lot of fun with the audience participation.

During the interval, I walked a few steps from my seat and asked security man Barrie Knight if I could take a picture of the stage. He said yes. I said to the other security man that I promise I won’t run on the stage and start singing. He said he would make that very difficult for me! haha. The second half began with “Sorrow” with that excellent extended guitar intro, which punctuates the song throughout the piece. I could be wrong, but I am sure I saw Guy Pratt with a fretless bass! It was like the 1980s all over again, I thought. The backing vocals from the Webb Sisters, Louise Marshall, and Romany Gilmour really brought the song alive.

Up next was “The Piper’s Call.” The little ukulele played by Charlie Webb filled the Hall. “A Great Day for Freedom” followed, with the a cappella vocal accompanied by piano showing Gilmour still has his vocal strength and control. For someone who is 78 to be able to sing like he does is impressive. “In Any Tongue” from Gilmour’s “Rattle That Lock” album was up next, with Romany doing the whistling bit at the start. The animated video that accompanied the song on the 2015/16 tour played out on the big screen back of stage. The band then moved towards the piano where singer Louise Marshall was firmly positioned to lead the band in performing “The Great Gig in the Sky.” With David’s new album being about mortality and death (a popular theme in his songs), it made much sense to include this number. The arrangement was excellent. A very emotional piece at the best of times was enhanced further with so many layers of vocals all complementing each other during the acoustic and stripped-back rendition.

The theme of mortality continued with “A Boat Lies Waiting.” In contrast, the band then performed “Coming Back to Life.” Again, the vocals of David Gilmour held up very well in what is a higher register song for his vocal range and is very dynamic. David’s vocals were far from “burned and broken” despite being resident at Circo Massimo and now the Royal Albert Hall.

The final three songs from David’s new album “Luck and Strange” completed the second set. “Dark and Velvet Nights,” “Sings,” and “Scattered” sounded excellent live. My favourite part of the new album is when the electric lead guitar kicks in during the song “Scattered.” The voice coming from David’s guitar during the final solo of “Scattered” had an ethereal quality to them from their musical phrase extension and variations of tone, cadence, and velocity. I can’t decide if this is better than the second solo in “Comfortably Numb!” The linking together of the musical phrases of the lead guitar, full of tone and emotion, sounded absolutely fantastic and was surreal watching David playing the song a very short distance in front of me, having listened to the song a hundred times on quality headphones. Worth the ticket price for that song alone.

The second set had ended, thank you very much indeed, lights are up, the stage becomes bare. Everyone knows he is coming back and knows exactly which song has to be the cherry on top of this very nice cake. Yes, “Comfortably Numb!” This song was originally demoed by David on a little recorder and the melody was hummed over a rough guitar. The demo ended up becoming part of Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” and one of the standout songs in the tome of Classic Rock. I could listen to that second solo constantly until my final day. Have a listen, I recorded the entire song.

That is the end of my David Gilmour Royal Albert Hall Review with photos and videos from the Royal Albert Hall. Please take a look at the full tour coverage on the David Gilmour Tour 2024 tour room page. There is also the David Gilmour photo album to see from the tour too. You might also want to learn more about David Gilmour’s band members for the 2024 tour.

Links – Visit David Gilmour’s Official Website