AUSTIN, Texas—Thirty-seven years ago Wednesday, the English rock band Pink Floyd released their double album ‘The Wall’, a concept album exploring themes of abandonment, personal isolation, and political unrest.
It is the last studio album released with the line-up of bass guitarist and lyricist Roger Waters, keyboardist Richard Wright, guitarist David Gilmour, and drummer Nick Mason before Wright was kicked out of the band.
The album was one of the best-selling of 1980. By 1999 it had sold more than 11.5 million albums, making it the third highest certified album in the United States. Rolling Stone Magazine placed 'The Wall' at No. 87 on its list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time".
--Tours--
The Wall – Live in Berlin was a live concert performance by Waters and numerous guest artists. The show was held in Berlin on July 21, 1990, to commemorate the fall of the Berlin Wall eight months earlier. The show had a sell-out crowd of over 350,000 people, and right before the performance started the gates were opened which enabled at least another 100,000 people to watch
Twenty years later,The Wall Live was a worldwide, solo tour by Waters from 2010 to 2013. The tour was the first time the The Wall had been performed in its entirety by any former members of Pink Floyd since the show in Berlin. It is estimated that the tour cost $60 million to stage. The first leg of the tour grossed in North America over $89.5 million from 56 concerts.
It was the second highest-grossing concert tour in North America in 2010 and the third highest-grossing concert tour worldwide as of 2013.
As of 2013, the tour holds the record for being the highest-grossing tour for a solo musician, surpassing the previous record holder, Madonna.
Watch a clip from the 2010 tour of Waters performing ‘Another Brick in The Wall’: