No Echoes by R J Dent

Villa Anamaria is an ornate Art Nouveau-style villa in Pefkos, on the Greek island of Rhodes. It is at the end of a beach road overlooking Askeftos Bay. The villa used to belong to Pink Floyd guitarist, David Gilmour, who sold it to an Italian couple several years ago.

 

Villa Anamaria 1990

 

On Pefkos maps, Villa Anamaria is still referred to as the ‘Pink Floyd Villa’.

It has been on the market for nearly five years, and is currently valued at 1.1 million Euros. So far, no one has offered to buy it, and Villa Anamaria is gradually beginning to look like an unloved, derelict building.

 

No Echoes

 

Once, Villa Anamaria, an ornate house

above a rocky, remote Rhodian bay,

was neat, discrete, resplendent in hot sun,

with turquoise wrought-iron gates and walled garden,

olive tree-lined stone drive and marbled paths

that led to subtly-arranged glades of shade,

past Grecian urns, manicured lawns, statues.

 

Now, just a millionaire’s discarded toy,

empty, abandoned, unwanted, disowned,

no echoes of the distant past resound

or sound in rooms now empty but for dust.

Silence, shutters askew, sun-faded walls,

cracked paving, overgrown groves, creeping weeds,

an empty swimming pool, lawns gone to seed.

 

 

Villa Anamaria 2016

 

No Echoes

by R J Dent

 

Copyright © R J Dent (2016)

 

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The Pink Floyd Story Considered as a NASA Space Flight Report by R J Dent

Precisely eight days and three minutes after their lunar launch on May 16, Pink Floyd (hereafter referred to as PF) crewmen Roger Waters, Nick Mason, Rick Wright and Syd Barrett landed PF at the recording studio in the Mohave Desert on the Eastern Seaboard, 399 miles east of American Samoa.

PF ventured closer to the moon than any craft has ever done, and the PF crew received the traditional hero’s welcome from those who waited in the pre-dawn hours aboard the SS Arnold Layne for its re-entry. Read more…

 

R J Dent says: ‘I always wanted to write a Pink Floyd story, and I was inspired to write The Pink Floyd Story Considered as a NASA Space Flight Report after reading J.G. Ballard’s The Assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy Considered as a Downhill Motor Race and Princess Margaret’s Facelift, both from Ballard’s classic, The Atrocity Exhibition.’

David Gilmour

Although On An island is a great David Gilmour solo album, his best solo album is his first album, simply entitled David Gilmour.

David Gilmour was released in May 1978 in the UK and on June 17, 1978 in the US. The album reached #17 in the UK and #29 on the Billboard US album charts and was certified Gold in the US by the RIAA. The album was produced by Gilmour himself, and consists mostly of bluesy, guitar oriented rock songs.

David Gilmour was recorded at Super Bear Studios in France between December 1977 and early January 1978 with engineer John Etchells. It was mixed at the same studio in March 1978 by Nick Griffiths. The cover was designed by Hipgnosis and David Gilmour.

The tracks are:

Mihalis – 6.00

There’s No Way Out of Here (Ken Baker) – 5:24

Cry from the Street (David Gilmour/Eric Stuart) – 5:18

So Far Away – 6:12

Short and Sweet (David Gilmour/Roy Harper) – 5:33

Raise My Rent – 5:49)

No Way – 6:14)

It’s Deafinitely – 4:29)

I Can’t Breathe Anymore – 3:40)

All songs by David Gilmour except as noted.

A five song promotional film was made to promote the album. The band comprised Gilmour himself on guitars and vocals plus the two musicians on the album (bass player Rick Wills and drummer Willie Wilson) plus David Gilmour’s brother Mark on rhythm guitar and Ian McLagen on keyboards. The band performed “Mihalis”, “There’s No Way Out of Here”, “So Far Away”, “No Way” and “I Can’t Breathe Anymore”. There were additional female backing singers on “There’s No Way Out of Here” and “So Far Away”. The performances of the tracks in the promotional film differed to the album versions.

“Mihalis” had an extended guitar solo at the end.

“There’s No Way Out of Here” was slightly shorter as one of the verses was deleted but the guitar solo at the end was different from that on the album and had a clean ending instead of fading out like on album version.

The track “So Far Away” had an extended guitar solo at the end on this performance and ended in a faster tempo than the album version.

The performance of the song “No Way” had Gilmour playing regular lead guitar solos at the end of the track on his Fender Esquire (with distortion) instead of the lap steel guitar solos (with distortion) that had appeared on the album version and had a clean ending instead of fading out like on the album (the remastered CD version of the album had Gilmour’s lap steel solo extended this time to feature a duel between himself playing high notes on his lap steel and lower notes on his trademark Stratocaster during the fadeout on the remaster). The middle part of the album version, for where the first of two lap steel guitar solos were on the album version, was deleted.

“I Can’t Breathe Anymore” had Gilmour playing a regular guitar solo at the end of this song’s performance whilst on the album version (and on the remastered CD in an extended coda), a distorted lap steel guitar countered the guitar solo at the end. The ending of the promo performance of “I Can’t Breathe Anymore” was longer than on the album.

And that’s David Gilmour for you. Arguably, it’s David Gilmour’s best solo album.

David Gilmour © R J Dent (2010)

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David Gilmour – Live in Gdansk

One of the best albums I’ve listened to recently is David Gilmour’s Live in Gdánsk.

 

 

 

On it, David performs songs from On An Island, as well as many of the Pink Floyd songs we all know and love. Here’s a track list:

Speak To Me

Breathe

Time

Breathe (Reprise)

Castellorizon

On An Island

The Blue

Red Sky

This Heaven

Then I Close My Eyes

Smile

Take A Breath

A Pocketful Of Stones

Where We Start

Shine On You Crazy Diamond

Astronomy Domine

Fat Old Sun

High Hopes

Echoes

Wish You Were Here

A Great Day For Freedom

Comfortably Numb

I’ve included a link to David Gilmour’s official Youtube channel:

http://www.youtube.com/user/officialdavidgilmour?blend=1&ob=4

David Gilmour

 

David Gilmour doesn’t need my help selling his music, but I enjoyed this collection of songs so much and was so impressed by their quality – for very often live albums tend to have a poor sound – that I wanted to encourage everyone interested in Gilmour’s music to listen to it.

Give Live in Gdánsk a listen – it’s a great album – you won’t regret it.

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