Track Listing

1. Mihalis
2. There's No Way Out Of Here
3. Cry From The Street
4. So Far Away
5. Short And Sweet
6. Raise My Rent
7. No Way
8. Deafinitely
9. I Can't Breathe Anymore

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3898 in Music
• Released on: 2006-08-14
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered

Customer Reviews

I like it more now .... than then
When this was first released I have to admit that I was disappointed and quite disliked it. I also thought that "About Face" and "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" fell well below the standards you would expect from David Gilmour. However, revisiting this 20 odd years on, I now cannot understand why I didn't like it. It's a little on the bluesy side of rock and relatively under produced - that may have been why I didn't like it - but now I think this really is a very good release and of course the remastering gives it a sonic quality way above that of my old vinyl copy. The overall sound and feel of this is not too far remmoved from "On An Island" For some reason I still don't like "About Face" though!

His first solo outing - and its well worth buying
I bought this in '78 when it was released on vinyl (followed years later by his second release 'About Face'). This is very much DG stretching his legs whilst still being strongly influenced by the overall sound and feel of Pink Floyd. This is especially true of 'No Way' - full of biting solos, a melancholic melody line and a recurrent jangling guitar riff behind the singing; complete with distant 'heavenly chorus'. All classic stuff.

On this CD DG experiments with a wide range of sounds and moods. For instance, in the space of three consecutive tracks he covers the following .....

THERE'S NO WAY OUT OF HERE - Lonely harmonica threading its way through a moody, sad song that develops into a soft rock number with classic DG riffs and breaks.
CRY FROM THE STREET - Chunky, distorted guitar-driven ballad with a classic Floyd drum rhythm. The singing now is echoey and distant. Then in comes the Hammond organ for that well-known Floydian moment.
SO FAR AWAY - Gentle acoustic piano introduces an equally gentle ballad that moves towards some wonderful 'doubled guitar' playing.

That is just a sample, but I hope it serves to illustrate the variety on this CD. It does very much have echoes and the feel of a Pink Floyd album - but to think of it only in this way is to do a severe injustice to the music and musicianship of a truly great guitarist, writer and performer.

Obviously, the release of 'Island' has sparked the remastering and re-release of DG's two previous solo albums. In my view, of the three, 'Island' is the least successful and 'About Face' is by far the best. That really is a truly storming album - the one that every fan of DG ought to seek out.

'David Gilmour' (this CD) should be the next choice - and after that, pray he doesn't wait another decade or more before releasing his next solo effort.

Paul H
As a thirteen year old schoolboy it was 'Dark Side of the Moon','Wish You Were Here' and 'Animals' that really made Pink Floyd the epi-centre of my adolescent musical universe. All that 'Hipgnosis' gatefold sleeve mallarky; stickers,posters postcards - FANTASTIC! The photograph on the inside of 'Meddle' also proved that they were the coolest looking band in the world; I had to have a short back and sides and wear 'Clarks Commandoes' and there was David Gilmour not just handsome but beautiful - the Platonic absolute idea of a 'hippy'! The music of course was breathtaking - it would be a waste of words to write anymore eulogies.If by 1977 you had a complete collection of Pink Floyd albums, the Syd Barrett solos and Music from 'The Body'(Roger and that bloke who did all the weird stuff on 'Atom Heart Mother'farting and blowing raspberries into a tape recorder- I tried to like it ,I really did!)as well as discovering 'Relics' on 'Starline'for a mere £1.89!You'd be casting around for something new and Pink Floyd. In 1978 all the Floyd members with the exception of Roger Waters, put out solo albums; Richard Wrights' more than creditable 'Wet Dream';some very haunting melodies and great sax by Dick Parry. Nick Masons 'Fictitious Sports' - Carla Bley notwithstanding - not as exciting as driving 2 million quids worth of old Ferrari round Brands Hatch!Then there was the eponymous 'David Gilmour';this really was a little gem. Gilmour teamed up with 'Foreigner' bass player Rick Wills (I believe they had previously played together in the blues band Gilmour left to join Pink Floyd in '68)to produce a collection of songs with none of the grand ambition and sophistication of recent Floyd albums, but did in a more modest way 'echo' their emotional scope. All the songs are beautifully crafted and thoughtfully arranged. There are no'duff' tracks or 'fillers' on this album. Each song needs every other song to produce a musical entity that is more than the sum of its' parts;the hallmark of a really good record- and a quality that makes the very best Floyd albums such staggering achievments.Highlights include 'There's No Way Out of Here' and some lovely guitar on 'Cry from the Street' simple arrangements beautifully executed. The best song - for me at least is 'So Far Away' with a haunting piano intro ( I think played by Gilmour himself?)I've often wondered how a man so endowed with all the gifts that nature- and indeed, consumer capitalism - has to offer, could possibly entertain such existential angst ( i read once in an interview with Roger Waters that he believed Gilmour was no lyricist. His output in this area is probably less consistent than some, but this song alone proves that Roger was wrong - but then at the time he would say that wouldn't he?)It is perhaps the same emotional incandescence that enables Gilmours guitar solo on 'Time'(without wasting a single note)break the heart of any sentient human being that dares to believe they have a soul.'David Gilmour' is no 'Dark Side of the Moon',but within its' more modest remit, it is nonetheless a wonderful collection of songs. I think in retrospect 1978 was the year that the 'real' Pink Floyd almost imperceptibly disappeared. 'The Wall' to be sure was epic in both its' ambition and execution, but one got the feeling that it was a personal statement made by Roger Waters, aided and abetted by three colleagues. That's not to say that Gilmours playing on the album is not of the highest order, but already there are shades of the self parody that mark out Pink Floyds later activities as dinosaurs making a few bob - and who can blame them? Go and buy 'David Gilmour'. It seems to me to be one of the last really authentic musical statements from a group of musicians who (like all great art)due to their own innate abilities, time and circumstance, made some of the most profound musical statements of our age, and made a thirteen year old boy weep bitter tears into his Vimto!