What if?

[quigs1969]

Is it true that "Your Possible Pasts", "One of the Few", "The Hero's Return" and "The Final Cut" were written for The Wall but left out because they were not good enough?

If this was the case I wonder what the track list of The Wall could have been in an alternate universe, What if .....

Along with these tracks you may also have had "When The Tigers Broke Free" said to be left out because it was too personal.

Could the track list have went something like this

In The Flesh
The Thin Ice
Another Brick In The Wall (Part I)
Your Possible Pasts"
One of the Few
When The Tigers Broke Free
The Hero's Return
The Final Cut
The Happiest Days Of Our Lives
Another Brick In The Wall (Part 2)

Does anyone else have any suggestions of what might have been?

Remember Final Cut haters it's only a What if...

[Flying pig437]

It's an album that can drive you to suicide as it is with those extra downers on it...

[quigs1969]

It's an album that can drive you to suicide as it is with those extra downers on it...

I love The Wall but I do agree that including those tracks would have been too much and would have def spoiled it.

[my breakfast.]

You would have a longer and even less convincing album.... that is all.

[moom]

I think The Hero's Return has more value in place of YPP on quigs' list. And The Final Cut would be between Goodbye Cruel World and Hey You because these have straight connections. And I wouldn't have erased the "...what's behind the wall" bit for the case).
Me and quigs seem to be in the same boat.

[stryder]

It is a myth that the The Final Cut includes cast-offs from The Wall. The ONLY song on the Final Cut that was written at the time of The Wall sessions is the song The Final Cut; all the rest of the songs were written afresh.

The next album after The Wall was originally entitled Spare Bricks which did plan to include songs that weren't eventually used for The Wall, but The Final Cut is a different entity to that original concept and should not be confused as such.

[quigs1969]

..... Spare Bricks which did plan to include songs that weren't eventually used for The Wall, ....

Does anyone have any idea what these unused "Spare Bricks" songs were called?

[stryder]

..... Spare Bricks which did plan to include songs that weren't eventually used for The Wall, ....

Does anyone have any idea what these unused "Spare Bricks" songs were called?

I've done a bit of digging up on this, and there aren't any "unknown" songs as such that were to be included in it, but more reworkings of songs that had already been included on the Wall, as well as 'When The Tigers Broke Free', which was to be eventually included on The Final Cut, and possibly 'What Shall We Do Now?' which was excluded from the final edit of The Wall for length reasons.

I believe that 'Sexual Revolution' on Roger Waters's solo album The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking was written at the same as The Wall demos, so maybe this would have been included in it as well, I don't know.

[J Ed]

I thought Spare Bricks was going to be the songs as theyd reworked them for the film
it would have been weird for them to put out a fragmentary album like that, after four albums in a row of polished unified songsuites
so I wasnt really disappointed when The Final Cut came out instead

theres been loads of discussions about the relationship tween The Final Cut and The Wall
this ones pretty good, at least for the first two pages
but it doesnt really address what precisely were the leftovers
theres also been discussion round some proposed early running orders included in a book by Floyd historian Vernon Fitch, that include alternate titles and at least one Final Cut song, but I seem to remember that being The Hero's Return not the title track
and at least one P&C song, and that one may have been Sexual Revolution, I cant think what else it would have been

P&C was actually written simultaneous to Rogers early drafts of The Wall

we know The Wall immersion set is going to include two cd's of Wall demos ... perhaps we'll finally get our answers straight from FloydCo

btw here's something else to imagine
according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

[Beowulf]

... according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

... and of course, we all believe 100% of everything on Wikipedia!

[Flying pig437]

I
btw here's something else to imagine
according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

That is something considering David always said TFC's songs weren't even good enough for The wall!

[Hudini]

1. theres also been discussion round some proposed early running orders included in a book by Floyd historian Vernon Fitch, that include alternate titles and at least one Final Cut song, but I seem to remember that being The Hero's Return not the title track and at least one P&C song, and that one may have been Sexual Revolution

2. btw here's something else to imagine
according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

1. According to some sources, both "The Hero's Return" and "Sexual Revolution" were at some point part of "The Wall" demos. It isn't hard to imagine how those two songs would have fit in the concept. The title track from "The Final Cut" could have also easily fit in, but there isn't any solid proof it is in fact a leftover from "The Wall", as well as other songs from "The Final Cut" which have been said to be "The Wall" leftovers, namely "Your Possible Pasts" and "One Of The Few". But it isn't really clear to me whether "Sexual Revolution" was originally a part of "The Wall" concept and then erased, or it was moved from "The Pros And Cons" to "The Wall" and back.

2. This is a misinterpretation. Wikipedia clearly states that during the production of "The Final Cut" Gilmour asked Waters for more time to finish a few songs, and Waters rejected it. It wouldn't be really fair to say those songs are leftovers since they weren't even considered to be a part of the album. Although personally I think that at least of the songs mentioned in that context ("Near The End") would have fit the album very well. Who knows, if Gilmour had them finished before he offered them to Waters, we might have had a completely different Pink Floyd today...

[Mokum69]

1. theres also been discussion round some proposed early running orders included in a book by Floyd historian Vernon Fitch, that include alternate titles and at least one Final Cut song, but I seem to remember that being The Hero's Return not the title track and at least one P&C song, and that one may have been Sexual Revolution

2. btw here's something else to imagine
according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

Wikipedia clearly states

[crowman]

David Gilmour actually likes the title track to The Final Cut, so it's hard to believe that it was dropped from The Wall for being below par. I believe there were three separate stages of development for The Final Cut album, and that it's possible to place each of its songs in one of those stages. Here are my guesses...

1. 1978 - The Wall and Pros & Cons demos
The Hero's Return
Your Possible Pasts

2. 1981 - Soundtrack to the Film (Spare Bricks)
One Of The Few
Paranoid Eyes
The Final Cut
Fletcher Memorial Home

3. 1982 - The Falklands and Margaret Thatcher
The Post War Dream
The Gunner's Dream
Get Your Filthy Hands Off My Desert
Southampton Dock (although part of the melody appears over the end credits of the film)
Not Now John
Two Suns In The Sunset

We know that Hero's Return is the only Final Cut song to definitely have been demoed for the Wall. Your Possible Pasts is also cited as being a reject (although it's not on the demos) and its chorus had been kicking around for many years. The melody for it crops up on Pros and Cons which was written at the same time. When the Tigers Broke Free also dates back to this point.

I think the bulk of the "Wall rejects" come from the second stage, but rather than being rejects they were written to order to help fill out the soundtrack album for the movie. The band initially thought they would re-record more songs from the original album, but when that didn't pan out they decided to incorporate more new songs and develop an alternative narrative, one that expanded on the character of the teacher. We also get "The Final Cut" song itself which seems to revisit the character of Pink, locked in his room, remembering his lost wife and feeling suicidal. Fletcher Memorial probably came at this point (and became the starting point for the final stage) but I'm also tempted by the idea that it may have been part of the Wall way back at the start. The line at the end about the Final Solution would be a perfect lead in to "In The Flesh" and the fascist theme at the end of The Wall.

By the third stage, The Wall had been forgotten and the next batch of songs dealt with Thatcher's Britain. The Wall rerecordings were dropped and the character of the teacher made the transition from supporting character to lead character in the new concept. I reckon Fletcher Memorial Home was the catalyst for this change in direction.

So at least six of the songs were written post-Falklands and four out of the remaining six were probably written during the Spare Bricks stage as a way of retelling the Wall narrative. That leaves only two songs at best that might originally have been part of the Wall.

But if they had never got to the third stage and had in fact released Spare Bricks, here's my version of what it would have looked like:

When the Tigers Broke Free (part 1)
Your Possible Pasts
One Of The Few
The Hero's Return (part 1)
When the Tigers Broke Free (part 2)
Mother
What Shall We Do Now?
Another Brick in the Wall (part 3)
Paranoid Eyes
The Hero's Return (part 2)
Bring The Boys Back Home
The Fletcher Memorial Home
In The Flesh (parts 1 and 2)
The Final Cut
Outside The Wall

All the Wall songs are the movie versions. I've put this together on CD and it works really well.

[moom]

I
btw here's something else to imagine
according to wikipedia, half of About Face was Final Cut leftovers, not that Dave ever seems to admit that much

That is something considering David always said TFC's songs weren't even good enough for The wall!

You should have read the article first, FP

Allegedly, some of the songs on About Face were being composed by Gilmour when Roger Waters began production of the Pink Floyd album, The Final Cut.

That is, these Gilmour songs weren't also leftovers from The Wall but simply composed around the time of TFC.