Roger Waters – In The Flesh: Live (2x SACD, 2000) {SACD ISO + FLAC 24bit/88.2kHz}

It’s nothing short of remarkable that Roger Waters has built a successful career on obsessive ruminations on alienation, megalomania, and guilty fame, largely on the backs of one of history’s most long-lived arena acts. The musical legacy Waters has shared with “another band” (as he sharply refers to his former Pink Floyd mates in this collection’s self-penned liner notes) has served two distinctly different functions: part and parcel of the latter’s nostalgia act; autobiographical foundation for the former’s ongoing, if decidedly egocentric, Rage at the World. That’s essentially the rationale this live collection uses to lean heavily on Waters’s Pink prime, from Dark Side of the Moon through The Final Cut. And if that frame sometimes overshadows the images of Waters’s solo work-well, no one said he wasn’t a pragmatic entertainer.

Roger Waters’ tours of the U.S. during the summers of 1999 and 2000 were a pleasant surprise, since the reclusive rocker had not toured since 1987. In his liner notes to this two-CD set drawn from those performances, Waters does not shy away from discussing his antipathy to big concert venues. But he makes a distinction between stadiums and arenas, and he also notes that he found himself becoming more comfortable in the role of a frontman. This more personable Roger Waters isn’t what comes across on the album, but the closer relationship he perceives to his audience is nevertheless palpable. As the man who wrote Pink Floyd’s lyrics, he is far more concerned with their meaning than his old bandmates, and his singing is emphasized without robbing the music of its magisterial power. In fact, with a band boasting several guitarists to make up for the lack of David Gilmour, Waters effectively re-creates the sound of his Pink Floyd work, which dominates the set list. The album contains only five selections out of 24 from Waters’ solo albums: one track from The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking and four from Amused to Death, with Radio K.A.O.S. left out completely. He does not choose the most obvious solo material, but he makes his selections work, especially “Perfect Sense (Pts. I & 2)” and “It’s a Miracle,” from Amused to Death. A new song, “Each Small Candle,” finds him still obsessed with world problems, but seemingly more optimistic. Waters had seemed to allow his anger about Pink Floyd’s continuance without him to keep him from claiming his own part of their legacy. His 1999-2000 touring changed that, and In the Flesh Live makes the point for those who couldn’t get to the shows.

Tracklist:
CD1 #01. In The Flesh
CD1 #02. The Happiest Days Of Our Lives
CD1 #03. Another Brick In The Wall, Part 2
CD1 #04. Mother
CD1 #05. Get Your Filthy Hands Off My Desert
CD1 #06. Southampton Dock
CD1 #07. Pigs On The Wing, Part 1
CD1 #08. Dogs
CD1 #09. Welcome To The Machine
CD1 #10. Wish You Were Here
CD1 #11. Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 1-8)
CD1 #12. Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun
CD2 #01. Breathe (In The Air)
CD2 #02. Time
CD2 #03. Money
CD2 #04. The Pros And Cons Of Hitchhiking, Part 11
CD2 #05. Perfect Sense (Parts I and II)
CD2 #06. The Bravery Of Being Out Of Range
CD2 #07. It’s A Miracle
CD2 #08. Amused To Death
CD2 #09. Brain Damage
CD2 #10. Eclipse
CD2 #11. Comfortably Numb
CD2 #12. Each Small Candle