Events From Roger's Youth That Influenced Later Life

[Keith Jordan]

Right, there are a few key events from Roger Waters early life that would go on to influence his behaviour and his song writing.

Death of Eric, his father - this event led to his mother being posessive and over-bearing in her butch Scottish ways over poor little Roger Waters. Roger said this was part of the influence for the song Mother in The Wall. Perhaps also this contributed to the theme of absense in Wish You Were here?


Can anyone think of any other early life influences?

[Dowie100]

If you accept 1967-70 or so as his youth, then I would say definately Syd's breakdown and departure from the band, also Syd's solo record that Roger helped with.

[henno]

I know wiki isnt the best source for facts but this is quoted there..
"However, he has said that the mother character from the latter album {the wall} was nothing like his own."

i have also read this previously in different interviews, i think his mother gets a bad rap from the album The wall, and particularly the song Mother....

she may have been protective and woriesome, but what mother isnt?
taking into account that she was a teacher and then principle of a high school, im sure she worried about how her sons behaviour impacted on her..... but she was also socialist in politics and kind of spirit..

Roger would later write :
"When I was 17 my mother, bless her heart, fulfilled my summer dream
She handed me the keys to the car"

now can anyone tell me what over protective and over powering mother in 1961 would lend her 17 year old son her car to travel from London to feckin Bagdad???

Rogers mother WAS NOT the mother from The Wall...!! end of rant....

[Keith Jordan]

In the book Pink Floyd: The Early Years in chapter one, it quotes an interview with Jim Ladd and Roger Waters. It sayeth that Roger said there are elements of the song Mother that are in common with his own mothing, but that they were points that were in common probably with everyone's mother! It also said she encouraged Roger to engage in casual relationships and not settle down with anyone! He went against that advice got married, and then divorced!!

[henno]

ok, upon some further research i found this:

Roger Waters,
Musician Magazine, May 1992


.....It is that which makes me feel there may well be something to be in tune with." Roger's description of his school illustrates how the traditional educational process seems designed to squash creativeness, a theme that he later explored artistically in The Wall. "My father was killed in the war when I was three months old, and I was brought up in Cambridge, England, by my mother, who's a school teacher. She didn't encourage my creativity. She claims to be tone deaf, whatever that means, and has no interest in music and art or anything like that. She's only interested in politics. I didn't really have a happy childhood. I loathed school, particularly after I went to grammer school. Apart from games, which I loved, I loathed every single second of it

so if hes quoted as saying that then, well, discard my previous rant....

[J Ed]

Rogers mother was a leftwing activist in the 50s and definitely influenced his political view, hes said so

also he tells us in the song Leaving Beirut: that road trip he took in the early 60s, especially the selfless generosity of the Lebanese couple, helped form his view of humanity as universal brotherhood rather than competing nationtribes

[MikeWaters]

I wonder what kind of Roger we would have got if they were mean to him! YIKES!

[Freddie Mercury]

He doesn't necessarily say his mother was mean to him though, just that she wasn't interested in art and music....

[peesea]

The Tone Deaf thing is amusing. I remember some book about floyd claiming Roger was completely tone deaf. If this is true he manages very well I gotta say.

Things that shaped his life up to this point?

1) His Fathers death in the war

2) Post War britain

3) His mother

4) His education

5) Syds Breakdown

6) The cynicism of the music industry

7) His marriage and subsequent breakdown thereof

Shrinks (probably as a result of Syd he had an interest, then with the depression that followed his marriage going under I think he's had serious and longterm "help") In his interviews he's constantly referring to "what we now know" about the human brain. This is a man who's spent alot of time listening to overpaid psychologists.

9) What happened with the Floyd after he quit in the 80's. It seems it's taken him many, many years and many visits to his shrink to deal with this and put it behind him.

10) Current world politics. Roger's a man who keeps abrest of the latest news. But, he is also a multi-millionaire and as such has a vested interest in the "establishment" staying the way it is. This must create a strange paradox for him. It's hard to rail against injustice when you are firmly on the pigs back yourself.


Rog is a complex man. But he's also learnt that he can express himself in a pure way through his music and does so in such a brilliant, universal way that we can all have empathy with his expression. Few have done this so brilliantly... Lennon, Dylan...as I say, not many.

To see what's shaped him just listen to the records from '73 through. Read the Lyrics. It's all there.