“Staggering”: The first two records David Gilmour ever bought
As much as they may be hailed as pioneers of psychedelic and progressive rock, the members of Pink Floyd were all growing up in the 1950s when neither of these existed, and were all transfixed on the emergence of rock and roll in their youth.
The ‘50s were undeniably a time for change culturally, and with the rise of rock and roll, blues, and pop all proving themselves to not just be a flash in the pan, young people were beginning to engage with music in ways that they hadn’t done previously.
The establishment of the singles chart in the UK in 1952 coincided with a rapid rise in a younger demographic purchasing records, and for those who went on to create new musical movements in the following decade, it was undoubtedly this flurry of activity in the ‘50s that spurred them on.
For David Gilmour, as much as his guitar playing in Pink Floyd can be described as ethereal and sonically groundbreaking for how it incorporated psychedelic influences, was still largely informed by the blues music that he had grown up listening to. Despite moving on to this more expansive sound, his earliest memories of engaging with pop music in this way all stem back to two artists in particular who shaped his musical ambitions from a young age.
Reflecting on this in a 1995 interview, Gilmour stated that the first two records that he bought were both from icons of this particular era, and that despite only having been 10 or 11 years old at the time, he was inspired by these releases to the point that it seemingly inspired his own trajectory.
“My first, first record I ever bought was ‘Rock Around The Clock’,” he claimed, referring to the 1954 single by Bill Haley and his Comets. With this having been the first rock and roll single to top the charts on both sides of the Atlantic, it’s a song that undeniably changed a lot in attitudes towards the burgeoning genre, and had people transfixed by the energetic and occasionally raucous way in which it presented itself.
In addition to this, Gilmour was perhaps even more taken aback by the next single he ever purchased with his own money. ‘The second was ‘Jailhouse Rock’,” he continued. “Elvis, in his very early years, was staggering. He went down hill a little bit, I suppose, under the influence of the good colonel. I don’t know what went wrong, but it certainly did.”
While he may well have been drawn in by the early performances of Elvis Presley, as much of the world was at the time, his acknowledgement of his late career decline through a barely-concealed reference to his love of fast food suggests a slight disappointment that he didn’t remain one of the leading figures in music.
However, there’s little doubt that hearing his earth-shattering work during the 1950s was enough to grab the attention of Gilmour and many others, and there was nothing that he could possibly do at this point in his career that would get in the way of him being an impeccable performer.
