Guy Pratt and Lee Harris recently discussed their ‘Saucerful Of Secrets Set The Controls Tour’ setlist with Classic Rock,
where Pratt revealed the one song David Gilmour has vowed never to play again. When the conversation turned to ‘Echoes,’ Pratt shared:
“It was a big deal playing ‘Echoes.’ I resisted it for all sorts of reasons and said I was never going to play it again after Rick died. Part of that was because David had said he was never going to play it again, so I was like, ‘Well, who the hell am I going to play it with?’ I never saw this band coming, did I? Ultimately, this is honoring Rick and it’s a rose to sing, and I love singing this with Gary. Dom deserves a shout-out here, he’s put a sound effect in, a thunder clap, that you think, ‘Why wasn’t that there before?’”
Gilmour’s Commitment to Rick Wright
On August 26, 2006, Gilmour and Richard Wright performed ‘Echoes’ for the last time at Gdańsk Shipyard in Poland, concluding Gilmour’s On an Island Tour. This tour also featured Nick Mason for some London gigs and appearances by David Bowie.
The Gdańsk show marked the final live performance of ‘Echoes’ and the last time Gilmour and Wright played together before Wright’s death in 2008. Since then, Gilmour has refrained from playing the song.
Before his 2016 show at the Amphitheatre of Pompeii, Gilmour explained why he wouldn’t perform ‘Echoes’ again:
“Yes, it would be lovely to play ‘Echoes’ here. But I wouldn’t do that without Rick. There’s something that’s specifically so individual about the way that Rick and I play in that, that you can’t get someone to learn it and do it just like that. That’s not what music’s about.”
Listen to ‘Echoes’ below.
