The song that made Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour pick up a guitar
David Gilmour was a school friend of Syd Barrett and Roger Waters in his youth, but he wasn’t welcomed to join Pink Floyd until the autumn of 1967 when Barrett’s mental health and addiction issues had begun to take a severe turn for the worse.
Shortly after Gilmour’s induction, Barrett became so unreliable amid his near-constant psychedelic abuse that he was regrettably forced to leave the band. Gilmour gradually incorporated his distinctive style into proceedings as the band developed in the late 1960s. Initially, however, he earned merit within the group for his astonishing ability to emulate Barrett’s style after such a short period of study.
Like most virtuosos, including Jimi Hendrix, Gilmour learned to play the guitar by ear. While he picked up the fundamental theory through a Pete Seeger guitar tutoring book, he sharpened his talent and unique style by listening to some of his favourite guitarists and emulating their intricate styles and tones.
As Pink Floyd developed from the psychedelic rock of the latter Barrett years towards the more refined sound of 1973’s prog-rock powerhouse, The Dark Side of the Moon, Gilmour’s lead guitar style became a sonic integration of his most cherished forebears. This style was mostly rooted in folk and blues music.
In an interview with Guitar Classics in 1985, Gilmour listed some of his biggest influences as a guitarist: “I was a blues fan, but I was an all-around music fan. For me, it was Lead Belly through B.B. King and later Eric Clapton, Roy Buchanan, Jeff Beck, Eddie Van Halen and anyone you care to mention.”
Gilmour has also long declared his advocacy for Hendrix. Speaking during his visit to BBC Radio 2’s ‘Tracks Of My Years’ in 2006, he picked out ‘The Wind Cries Mary’ as one of his all-time favourites and recalled when he first heard the late icon: “Jimi Hendrix, fantastic. I went to a club in South Kensington in 1966, and this kid got on stage with Brian Auger and the Trinity and [held] the guitar the other way around and started playing. Myself and the whole place were with their jaws hanging open.
“I went the next day to the record shops, and I said, ‘You’ve got anything by this guy Jimi Hendrix?’ and they said, ‘Well, we’ve got a James Hendrix’. He hadn’t yet done anything. So I became rather an avid fan waiting for his first release. Also, this is one of his beautiful ballads that I really love.”
While Gilmour’s career has benefited from the riding of many influential waves over the years, the spark that caused the flame occurred back in 1955, when he was just ten years old, courtesy of Bill Haley and His Comets.
“It’s very hard to tell what made me first decide to play the guitar,” Gilmour told Charlie Kendall of The Source Radio Show in 1984. “‘Rock Around the Clock’ by Bill Haley came out when I was ten, and that probably had something to do with it.”
Listen to Bill Haley’s seminal 1955 chart-topping sensation’ Rock Around the Clock’ below.
