Inside Out

by Nick Mason

  Our additional keyboard player, Jon Carin, had originally met David at the Live Aid show at Wembley Stadium. Jon was playing with Bryan Ferry, and since David was playing guitar in the same band he had an opportunity to view Jon’s skills at first hand. Jon was also up to date on sampling techniques, which was particularly useful when we found we needed to re-create the sounds produced by long defunct keyboards now languishing in the Science Museum.

  Guy Pratt arrived at the Astoria for an audition when I was present since David wanted a second opinion. Guy’s rather less than respectful attitude to the Dinosaur Kings of Rock when asked to run through the bass parts alerted us to the fact that apart from being able to play them all with one hand behind his back – or indeed with a monumental hangover, and sometimes both – he would be an easier touring companion than someone who started in awe of us and then became bitterly depressed on getting to know us better. By coincidence, Guy’s songwriter father Mike had co-written ‘Rock With The Caveman’ with Lionel Bart and Tommy Steele, which was a pleasing connection with my youthful visit to see Tommy in the late Fifties.

  Gary Wallis was spotted playing percussion with Nick Kershaw at a charity show where David was also appearing. Neither of us had ever seen anything like it. Instead of sitting down to play Gary was working in a kind of cage stuffed full of percussion, some pieces of which were mounted so high that a three-foot leap was needed to strike the required object. With his obvious musical skills this additional showmanship seemed an ideal bonus for a stage that looked initially as though it might be occupied by the living dead.

  The saxophonist Scott Page was another stage show in his own right. Our only problem here was holding him down, possibly strapping him down. With relatively few saxophone parts in the show, Scott became a Phantom Of The Opera figure. At the slightest excuse he’d be back up on stage, a guitar strapped around his neck, in the hope of finding himself another part to play, or doing a Status Quo along to David’s guitar solos. He didn’t have a radio mike, and used a standard guitar lead, so the road crew – possibly inspired by our tour manager Morris Lyda’s rodeo background – would chop a few inches off the lead each night to restrict his movement and rope him in. He was lucky they didn’t hog-tie him down.

  On guitar, Tim Renwick had the best credentials of all. A native of Cambridge, he had been to the same school as Roger, Syd, David and Bob Klose, although some years behind. His earlier bands had been produced by David and he had also played on Roger’s solo work. On the occasions David was absent from rehearsals, Tim made an excellent deputy as musical director.

  The backing singers on the tour were assembled from various sources. We met Rachel Fury through James Guthrie, and Margaret Taylor was an LA-based singer who had worked on the album sessions. Durga McBroom, a former member of Blue Pearl, completed the initial trio – her sister Lorelei later replaced Margaret for the latter part of the tour.

  We arrived in Toronto for rehearsals at the beginning of August 1987. This was mainly due to Michael Cohl’s Canadian connections; the tour was also opening there. David was coming on later after completing the mixing of the record, while we moved into a very hot rehearsal room along with a mountain of new equipment to start work. We both wanted the feeling of a homogeneous band rather than a split between principals and sidemen. The nature of the new music was much more in this style anyway, and would not easily lend itself to being played live by a four-piece. After two weeks it was sounding roughly right, although this was at the expense of a lot of late nights from Jon and Gary as they struggled with endless disks of samples (‘Everything’s crashed, man, another two days without sleep should see it right’).

  The band then relocated to the airport to join the crew, who had been working on the set-up. This choice of locale turned out to be a bright idea and gave us a penchant for airfields as rehearsal bases: they provide excellent engineering facilities on site, as well as easy shipping for delivery of a constant stream of high-tech heavyweight items of equipment that were inevitably arriving late.

  Security was easy to maintain; we lost far more tools and personal effects in the very smart hotels we stayed in than we ever did in the hangars. And insecurities were easier to avoid. We didn’t have to perform for the endless stream of people who manage to find some reason to hang about at any sort of rehearsal. The fact that we also got to have a go on the 747 simulator and fly it round the CNN tower, to sit in a USAF F14 that was visiting for an air show, and generally hang around an airfield added to the general pleasure of the experience. Both David and I were doing quite a lot of flying in the period leading up to this record, and apart from ‘Learning To Fly’ the aviation theme was carried on throughout the tour. MTV gave away an aeroplane and flying lessons as a promotion prize, while the tour party sported aviator jackets rather than the normal embroidered satin baseball-style ones.

  By now, the album was ready to be launched. David and I increased our workload by spending most of each morning doing an endless round of phone interviews. This was a better alternative than a whistle-stop tour of America visiting radio and TV stations, and we certainly couldn’t do anything in Europe, so we settled into answering the same questions that we have dealt with for thirty-odd years – ‘How did the band get their name?’, ‘Where’s Syd?’, ‘Why has the band lasted so long?’ – along with some new ones about the fight with Roger, and tried to sound surprised at the novelty of it all.

  Meanwhile, out at the airport Paul, Robbie and Marc, along with Morris Lyda, were trying to assemble one hundred tons of steel into a stage and then work out how to pack it into a truck. Morris was a new personality to us, although already a legend in rock-show circles. An ex-rodeo rider, he had moved on to something more challenging as a rock tour manager. Having worked on the previous Genesis tour, along with 50 per cent of the rest of our crew, he had the necessary experience. As usual, the initial impression of a group of professional and responsible technicians began to dissolve as one French telescan operator was reprimanded for eating the contents of the ashtrays in a club for a bet…

  By the time we arrived at the hangar we were the last thing the crew wanted to see. Not only would we mess up their beautifully arranged stage and demand changes, but anything they wanted to do had to be done with 50,000 watts of PA killing all conversation. Eventually we managed to come to an arrangement, with quiet periods as required, but it all felt much slower than we needed. The size of the crew was vast compared to anything we had done before. Even The Wall had only required some sixty people; now we had over 100. Not only was it very difficult to learn all their names, a year later it was still a struggle, particularly as some came or went or were on one show in three if they were part of the leapfrogging crew.

  Among the difficulties were some special moments. Marc would often spend all night programming the lights and my first sight of his efforts was unforgettable, because it was so spectacular. On stage you have no concept of what the external view is like. For example, the circular screen with the lights attached appeared – from my drum stool – like just another lighting truss. Looking at the stage from out front I could see the full impact of its swirling patterns of light.

  Apart from the quantity of crew we also had telephones in triplicate, radio systems, faxes and a drawing office. The last tour hadn’t even had a production office. Morris favoured briefing sessions that had more affinity with D-Day than a rock show. After the jobs had been evaluated, allocated and criticised, a short homily on aggression in the field would have fitted in perfectly. When Morris said ‘marine’ he wasn’t talking dolphin, he was talking Iwo Jima. We needed this sort of character.

  One of the first duties assigned upon the arrival of the band was the packaging for the road of David’s rowing machine. David seemed to think that the fight with Roger might be resolved in the ring rather than the courts and was training every day, using this wonder device that measured your progress electronically and could pit your rowing against any competitor you cared to dream up
. The downside was that it weighed four hundred pounds and was ten foot long. The final road box looked like a coffin for the Incredible Hulk, and weighed as much. Nor had anyone allowed for it when packing the trucks. Eventually it was used as a punishment for the last truck out, which had to take it. Loading productivity increased by 30 per cent.

  Meanwhile, we had asked Bob Ezrin to come in and lend us a hand. We needed someone to have a look at the overall show. I think we had been so busy on the music that, although we had a fabulous lighting set-up, the band on stage was a mess. This was just up Bob’s street. He equipped himself with a loudhailer and entertained us strutting up and down in front of the stage shouting loud but unintelligible advice while conducting drum fills with wild gesticulations at the same time. Later on we modified this communication system for something a little higher tech.

  We also had to address relatively simply but vital issues: how and when we got on stage, how the numbers finished, whether we wanted to be lit between songs or simply segue into the next. And if any musician was to move we also had to ensure that they would not be lost forever by plunging down one of the trapdoors that disguised many of the more unusual lighting rigs.

  The final dress rehearsal before we headed out to Ottawa was held at night. It was a warm summer’s evening, and as we played the huge hangar doors were open, with large jets slowly taxiing past to the runways. As the music wafted out over the area, an uninvited audience of airport personnel arrived. Gradually the interior and exterior of the hangar filled with a wonderful collection of service and emergency vehicles, all with their revolving amber lights activated. It beat the more conventional use of swaying cigarette lighters into a cocked hat.

  The atmosphere before the first show in Ottawa was electric – well, it was backstage even if not in the rather damp field out front. The new album was not even available in the shops, so we were starting off playing unfamiliar music to a probably sceptical audience. We awarded ourselves top marks afterwards for surviving, but we were well aware that, although most of the technical side worked, the performance was well below par. We steeled ourselves for more rehearsal time, and yet another revision of the set list.

  With the fairly intense schedule that we had set ourselves everything began to settle in rapidly, and over the first few shows we were able to refine and change the show, rather than learn it. We were still quite short of material, and one extra encore found us with nearly nothing more to play: we plumped for ‘Echoes’. We were not that familiar with performing the song, and the piece sounded a little stilted – it was the last time we ever played the number. David now observes that one of the reasons we couldn’t quite recapture the feel of the original was that the younger musicians we were now working with were so technically proficient they were not able to unlearn their technique and just noodle around as we had in the early Seventies.

  After correcting a few musical and technical aspects, the shows started gelling relatively quickly despite the occasional glitch. As a result the individual shows tend in retrospect to merge into a seamless flow. In fact the show was feeling so comfortable that we started trying to film the shows early on, but unfortunately, having filmed in Atlanta at the Omni, we didn’t like the results. We hadn’t spent enough and it showed. So to punish ourselves, along with everyone else, we tried it all over again in New York in August the next year. We ordered twenty cameras and ended up with two hundred hours of film. Someone is still probably incarcerated in an edit suite somewhere viewing the results.

  Simultaneously, Roger’s Radio KAOS tour was criss-crossing North America. We studiously managed to avoid each other, although a couple of our personnel went to see his show. I didn’t want to see it – out of sight, out of mind – but in any case rumour had it we would not be allowed in, and I had no intention of being escorted ignominiously from the premises. We eventually formalised a settlement with Roger. On Christmas Eve 1987, during a break in touring, David and Roger convened for a summit meeting on the houseboat with Jerome Walton, David’s accountant. Mince pies, noggin and festive hats were placed on hold, as Jerome painstakingly typed out the bones of a settlement. Essentially – although there was far more complex detail – the agreement allowed Roger to be freed from his arrangement with Steve, and David and me to continue working under the name Pink Floyd. The document was then handed over to our respective and expensive lawyers to be translated into legalese. They all singularly failed to achieve this; in the end the court accepted Jerome’s version as the final and binding document and duly stamped it.

  After the first leg in the States, we headed to New Zealand for our first visit: it was like being in England in a time warp, but a pleasant one. Seeing the local musicians I realised how hard it must be starting out there: even if you made it big in New Zealand you wouldn’t make any money for the record company, so then you had to make it in Australia – and there would still be many rungs to climb. After the shows in Auckland, we returned to Australia after a long absence. The last time we’d played, in 1971, we had arrived at the wrong time of the year in bitter cold. This time we were determined to do it properly – and it turned out to be smooth and easy. The band would occasionally head for a club to jam led by the new recruits. They performed a number of times in Australia billed as The Fisherman’s (short for Fisherman’s Friend). I think they rehearsed harder for the renditions of ‘Unchain My Heart’ and ‘I Shot The Sheriff’ than they did for the main show…

  After Australia, Japan was a little more difficult. There was no outdoor show, and shuttling between large auditoria, we had less time to experience the country. Even the cameras seemed more expensive this time. On the way back to the US, Nettie and I stopped over in Hawaii for a delightful couple of weeks, although the occasional burst of torrential rain was a throwback to a classic British seaside holiday.

  On a professional level this tour had been the most enjoyable ever, and it had been particularly so on a personal level. Nettie had come along for the entire time, from the rehearsals in Toronto onwards, and had increased the pleasure of the whole enterprise immeasurably. She had been on theatre tours as an actress, but the scale of this and the numbers of people and amounts of logistics and material involved were something of an eye-opener for her. What I definitely appreciated was that going on tour without a partner was likely to put a strain on most relationships – I once worked out that 90 per cent of this particular tour party had left a trail of broken marriages and partnerships behind them. It seemed to be the case that you either took your wife along, or invited your divorce lawyer to accompany you.

  The second leg in the States reinforced the law that all effects have the capacity for disaster: during a show in Foxboro, Massachusetts, the flying pig snagged somewhere and was ripped to pieces by an over-enthusiastic, or fanatically vegan, audience.

  By the time we arrived in Europe the band had really settled into the groove: they were a hard-working group of musicians, who regularly – Jon Carin particularly – reviewed the tapes of the previous night’s show to try and note any imperfections. Their professionalism was impeccable: even if Guy Pratt was the last out of the bar the night – or morning – before, his playing was faultless on stage, a tribute to his iron constitution or the fact that our music was too easy.

  We had developed a comfortable way of living and working together on tour, by not dividing up into cliques and enjoying a reasonable level of fun. We would occasionally throw a Wally party after the show, the idea being to turn up dressed as appallingly as possible. The local thrift shops would be drained of shell suits; nylon was the order of the day. The tour had been, according to Phil Taylor – who had been touring with us since the mid-1970s – great fun, with a good spirit and a sense of relief that we were back out on the road.

  If any constitutions were wilting the following day, their owners could turn to Scott Page, who had become the tour’s unofficial herbal tea salesman. He was nearly as good at this as playing the saxophone, and soon a fair number of the band we
re to be seen clutching horrible plastic bottles of urine-coloured liquid which they insisted on drinking at all times. Fortunately like most tour fads – Japanese cameras, buckskin cowboy jackets and tequila sunrises – it was short-lived, and I can only hope Scott still has vast quantities of those awful herbs stuffed in his attic.

  In Europe the shows were more varied and have stuck in my mind for longer, mainly due to the venues we chose. Sometimes we could add an extra level of variety: in Rotterdam, we arranged for a pre-show air display, accompanied by ‘Echoes’ on the PA system by two motor gliders, flown by friends of ours whom David and I had met through learning to fly. Their graceful aerial balletics trailing smoke seemed like a good idea for other dates, but we were defeated by the complications of getting permission for them to fly in restricted air space.

  Versailles was probably the grandest of the European shows. These events would come together through a combination of Steve recceing possible locations and direct approaches from interested parties. At the time, François Mitterand’s Minister of Culture was the dynamic Jack Lang. He was on side for the Versailles project – which helped in the politicking to convert any doubters – and it seemed a natural meeting of minds.

  The setting was magnificent, and most of the French were pleased to see us there. Certainly there were lengthy speeches from local dignitaries, one of whom seemed to have offered his support only if his name could appear above the band’s on an official plaque. I was called on at short notice to deliver a brief speech – having hastily cobbled together a few clichés, my mumbled utterance was unlikely to trouble historians of the entente cordiale. We had great weather, and it felt like a special occasion. This is really the aim of trying to work in unique places. A stadium is much more convenient for any large show, but it is more difficult to create such a special atmosphere. Whenever possible it does seem worth making the effort to utilise settings with a sense of history and place.