Roger Waters: In The Flesh : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

In the Flesh, recorded during Roger Waters' solo tour last year, presents Waters in concert with well-rehearsed studio musicians working through a mix of his Pink Floyd and solo material. There's admirable sonic purity to these live recordings, but that only underscores the astonishing lack of verve in the performances. Tracks from The Wall such as "Mother" and "Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2" suffer not only from comparison to Pink Floyd's original concerts (see Is There Anybody Out There?: The Wall Live 1980-81, released last year) but also fail to match up to Waters' own live release of The Wall from 1990. In the Flesh was partly recorded at a Las Vegas concert, but these songs lack even a hint of theater or showmanship. Fans may enjoy the adequate live takes on excerpts from Animals and Wish You Were Here. At worst, though, this is a Pink Floyd cover band featuring the original bass player. This becomes especially clear during what should be David Gilmour's vocal on "Comfortably Numb," at which point the song's sentiment becomes all too accurate. Yawn.