The truth about Rick Wright's contribution on The Wall

[Bigmanpigman]

It's a well known fact that Roger was into the 'publishing' side of things very early in his career, and you can't blame him for that. But what ensued is a whole bunch of tracks, over a period of around 10 years, credited to Roger as the writer, when there were significant contributions from Dave and Rick for sure. This is a pattern littered around the rock world of the '60s/'70s/'80s where the guys who were smart back in the day are pulling in big bucks off the back of other peoples' efforts. I'm not saying Roger wasn't creative. He always worked hard at it. But, to my mind, he always needed Dave and Rick to arrive at the finished product.

[Flathead]

In many ways in rock'n'roll, playing does actually equal either writing or arranging. Bands like Pink Floyd, who award credits only for writing lyrics and forming a musical skeleton of the song, are a good example for that.

Only? That's the song. Anyone can play an instrument. They are known as session musicians. only a few can write timeless music.

Per instance, there is no way that Waters wrote the guitar solo Gilmour played on ABITW2, and yet Gilmour received no credit for it.

Why would he? He didn't write the song.

For some reason, the first solo by Rick Wright I can think of is the one in 'San Tropez' - another song credited completely to Roger Waters.

Solo's are not songs, and largely superfluous. Any decent musician can play a solo over an arrangement. It's one of the easiest things to do in music. The music industry recognizes this fact in how credits are doled out.

[Flathead]

It's a well known fact that Roger was into the 'publishing' side of things very early in his career, and you can't blame him for that. But what ensued is a whole bunch of tracks, over a period of around 10 years, credited to Roger as the writer, when there were significant contributions from Dave and Rick for sure. This is a pattern littered around the rock world of the '60s/'70s/'80s where the guys who were smart back in the day are pulling in big bucks off the back of other peoples' efforts. I'm not saying Roger wasn't creative. He always worked hard at it. But, to my mind, he always needed Dave and Rick to arrive at the finished product.

It has nothing to do with "getting into publishing early on", but rather how the publishing industry awards credits. PLaying instruments is not writing a song. Lyrics, melody, and chorus/verse are the song. Everything else is window dressing. Go back and listen to "All Along the Watchtower" by Dylan off John Wesley Harding. That's the song, man. You can add an electric guitar solo, or keyboard solo, or other easy to play over the difficult, hand-crafted original composition, but that is still the CORE song.

[Bigmanpigman]

It's a well known fact that Roger was into the 'publishing' side of things very early in his career, and you can't blame him for that. But what ensued is a whole bunch of tracks, over a period of around 10 years, credited to Roger as the writer, when there were significant contributions from Dave and Rick for sure. This is a pattern littered around the rock world of the '60s/'70s/'80s where the guys who were smart back in the day are pulling in big bucks off the back of other peoples' efforts. I'm not saying Roger wasn't creative. He always worked hard at it. But, to my mind, he always needed Dave and Rick to arrive at the finished product.

It has nothing to do with "getting into publishing early on", but rather how the publishing industry awards credits. PLaying instruments is not writing a song. Lyrics, melody, and chorus/verse are the song. Everything else is window dressing. Go back and listen to "All Along the Watchtower" by Dylan off John Wesley Harding. That's the song, man. You can add an electric guitar solo, or keyboard solo, or other easy to play over the difficult, hand-crafted original composition, but that is still the CORE song.

It has everything to do with 'getting the publishing early on'. Some bands agreed to share it between them, four or five ways (eg Black Sabbath). Often this ended up in the courts many years later. But with many bands one member (eg Roger) was savvy to the income which could/would be available in later years, whether or not that person was wholly responsible for the writing of the song.

[mastaflatch]

Imagine how absurd it would be if Nick Mason had the same songwriting credit than Roger Waters. Or Ringo was treated - in the publishing royalties - as an equal to Lennon & McCartney.
Personally, when I want to know more about the songwriters in a band, it bugs the hell out of me when all members are always credited since it cannot be true unless it's a jam band that makes up riffs out of thin air.
I'm in a band in which I'm the main songwriter and since I'm a nice guy and acknowledge the other guys' input even when they don't contribute to the actual songwriting, I give them an equal share of royalties under the "arranger" option but when they don't bring someth ing that alters the structure of the song, they're not mentionned as co-songwriters on the record sleeve.

[duffOnTheRun]

I created this topic because I wanted the fans to know the real contribution of Rick Wright for The Wall. Information collected by Fitch and Mabett for their books, as well as James Guthrie's recent comments are essential to understand Rick's contribution for that record. The wall is not the highlight for Rick's career of course, but the truth needs to be known.

About songwriting credit on Pink Floyd career, it' a subject that deserves to have its own topic in this forum! For a 3 minutes pop song, it's easy to determine who is the songwriter. However, for long and / or unusual songs such as Pink Floyd where instrumental parts are so important, it's different. Roger Waters was a great songwriter, but IMHO, I think he was a bit greedy to share credits on some songs.

[Hudini]

Per instance, there is no way that Waters wrote the guitar solo Gilmour played on ABITW2, and yet Gilmour received no credit for it.

Why would he? He didn't write the song.

OK, now what about this: Gilmour changed the time signature for his solo in 'Money', from 7/4 to 4/4. Still, only Waters received the credit. But I suppose that changing time signatures isn't arranging and that's what any session musician would do?

[Flathead]

A solo is not a song.

Roger showed up with the lyrics, chorus, verse, and melody. He wrote the song. Performing over a song is not writing a song.

Go back and listen to "All Along the Watchtower" by Bob Dylan. That's the core of a song with no trimmings. A good song still works at its barest levels. A guitar solo or synth solo with nothing else does not.

[Hudini]

Performing over a song is not writing a song.

I guess that when you sit down with a pen and a music sheet and write your solo down, that's not writing? That's just performing, right?

Or, in that case, if you just memorize a song and play it by ear, that's not composing either, since it's not written? Or if a group of musicians starts a spontaneous jam that ends up being recorded and published, who gets a credit then? No one, because no one pre-wrote the song before the recording, or everyone?

However, credits are most usually either a band or a record company decision and not a convention of who writes or improvises what. The best example when talking about Pink Floyd is Clare Torry, who improvised a vocal melody that Wright's TGGITS became recognized by, and yet Wright has been credited as the only composer of the song for more than 30 years. Then again, it was the court who ruled that her improvisation (note that she did not pre-write her part!) should earn her a songwriting credit and all due royalties. Now, receiving a songwriting credit formally equals to writing a song, doesn't it?

[Vlad The Impaler]

One might also differentiate between writing and arranging if one were to think about it depending on the situation.

[tjrrockandrollmaster]

Also bands like Rush, post-1978 Genesis (up to Phil Collins' departure) had democratic band policies where the band wrote the songs together.

Trouble is that Roger got power hungry! The original Wall demos of Roger was just him and a guitar. David Gilmour brought three music pieces (all of Comfortably Numb's music, all of Run Like Hell's music and most of Young Lust's music) to The Wall. Roger began to think he was the band starting on Animals. The band feeling was gone although Animals is one Hell of a record, I listen to live recordings more than the studio version. Example Pigs Three Different Ones saw Rick do a Mini-Moog solo live rather than the voice box solo David did on record (David just played the rhythm riff and also soloed after the second verse before a reprise of the "you're nearly a laugh" part before the section where the voice box was originally). Also the ending where Rick soloed on the Hammond organ and the ending sped up brought the song to its potential!

[mastaflatch]

what some of you seem to fail to understand is that a systematically shared writing credit isn't based on reality; it's a "democratic" way of redistributing royalties.
as some said, Genesis used to do this. Pearl Jam did this in 1993. why did they changed this? because it's not fair for the guy who actually writes songs. you're a fabulous lead guitarist but you have no clue how to put a song together? fine, you have the right to live too but don't fool yourself into thinking you're a songwriter because you know your scales - it doesn't have a lot to do with songwriting.
All Along the Watchtower was a fine example. so would be Hear My Train A'Comin' and countless blues standards that have been adapted into successful rock staples.
I'm all for giving credit where credit is due; Harrison and Starr should have been credited for Eleanor Rigby, Lennon should have been credited for Taxman. on the other hand, I don't think that Clare Torry should have been credited for GGITS although she should have been given a fair amount of money for her performance. it's a performance for the ages, it's a classic but she didn't alter the original composition, she sang a vocal solo on it.

[Bigmanpigman]

Black Sabbath are a good band to feature on with regard to this subject matter. As I mentioned, they split the publishing four ways. But in reality they were a bit like Lennon/McCartney - Tony did the riffs and Geezer wrote the lyrics generally. There were odd bits from Ozzy and Bill. When Ozzy went solo take a look at the writing credits for 'Bark at the Moon', his third album. All of the sudden Ozzy has grown into a full blown writer of a whole album. Or has he? You have to bare in mind that he has an a manager (Sharon) who knows every trick in the book. How does this sound? - 'Either Ozzy gets the writing credits or you are out of the band'.

[Flathead]

Performing over a song is not writing a song.

I guess that when you sit down with a pen and a music sheet and write your solo down, that's not writing? That's just performing, right?

When you write it over a chord/verse melody and lyrics of an actual song, no, it's not.

However, credits are most usually either a band or a record company decision and not a convention of who writes or improvises what. The best example when talking about Pink Floyd is Clare Torry, who improvised a vocal melody that Wright's TGGITS became recognized by, and yet Wright has been credited as the only composer of the song for more than 30 years. Then again, it was the court who ruled that her improvisation (note that she did not pre-write her part!) should earn her a songwriting credit and all due royalties. Now, receiving a songwriting credit formally equals to writing a song, doesn't it?

It has nothing to do with "pre-writing". Claire created the melody, therefore she earns a credit. Was rick being greedy by not giving her a credit?

[Flathead]

Trouble is that Roger got power hungry! The original Wall demos of Roger was just him and a guitar.

Have you actually heard his Wall demos? The concept and song structures are all there. It's freaking brilliant. It's no wonder that he received most of the credit.