Roger Waters in Birmingham: An agitator at his best, showing Britain can't cancel the sublime
Roger Waters opened his British tour with an emotional 10 minute rant about his mistreatment in Germany, how good it was to be back in Britain but how upset he was about a recent “hatchet job” in the “f****** Telegraph” and how this paper (and “the Times of London” in fairness) had come to his Birmingham Arena concert just to “rip my balls off.”
Apparently convinced the British press won’t be happy until his career has been destroyed, he defiantly roared “I will not be cancelled! Especially when its all lies. I’m fighting back, Mr Telegraph!”
Visibly shaking and almost in tears at times, the 79-year-old thanked the 15000 strong audience for their noisy support. Nevertheless, I have come not to bury Mr Waters, but to praise him. He’s been creating powerful, dazzling, emotional and politically resonant shows for over 60 years, and this latest iteration may well be his best.
Clearly feeling rather embattled, the former Pink Floyd bassist, lyricist and vocalist arrived in Birmingham trailing outrage and controversy, which, to be fair, has been pretty much his default state since the late 1970s.
Waters is under investigation by Berlin police for “incitement to public hatred” for wearing a “Nazi-style” uniform during concerts last week. “I’ve been wearing that leather coat since the Wall in 1980,” he bitterly pointed out onstage.
The satirical uniform was left in a backstage wardrobe in Birmingham, lest it prove a distraction. Not that Waters was repentant.
“If you’re one of those ‘I love Pink Floyd but I can’t stand Roger’s politics’ people, you might do well to f*** off to the bar,” was his message to the doubters.
Anyone who has followed Waters’ career knows that he is not a closet fascist, indeed, arguably quite the opposite, he is an extremist peacenik agitator who tours the world staging huge rock shows espousing views opposing, well, “authoritarianism, oppression, fascism, bigotry and injustice in all its forms,” as Water put it.
He is avowedly pro-Palestinian, calling for boycotts of “apartheid state” Israel, and has adopted a controversial position on the Russo-Ukrainian war that depicts NATO as the chief villains, which Waters justifies with torturous arguments about peace. His “Putin apologist” views have already got this tour banned in Poland.
But you can get away with a lot when you have created music as sublime, mesmerising and far reaching as this. The huge high definition screens displayed vivid and unambiguously politically imagery, inflatable pigs and sheep flew overhead and a nine-piece band thrillingly recreated Floyd’s epic sound with modern dynamism and an added angry bite of Waters’ innate fierceness. Its an absolutely storming show.
“That went well, I think,” said a visibly cheered up Waters basking in the adulation a standing ovation at the end. In my view, whatever you think about his politics, Waters is beyond cancellation, unless he starts to consider it all too much aggravation and cancels himself.
This is being billed as Waters’ First Ever Farewell Tour. It will be a sad day for rock and roll if it really turns out to be his last. So says Mr Telegraph.
