David Gilmour Fires Back At Roger Waters For Preventing The Release Of ‘Animals’ Reissue

Pink Floyd guitarist and co-lead vocalist David Gilmour revealed if the band is planning on releasing a reissue of the album, ‘Animals’ during a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, and apparently, it’s bassist Roger Waters who is getting in the way of releasing the remix version by insisting on having liner notes.

As many of you know, ‘Animals’ is the tenth studio album including 5 songs of Pink Floyd, released on January 21, 1977, focusing on the social-political conditions of mid-1970s Britain. The album received generally positive reviews both from critics and fans and it was a commercial success reaching number 3 on US Billboard 200 and number 2 in UK Albums Chart.

As you might recall, Roger Waters shared a video on his official YouTube channel announcing that a new mix of ‘Animals’ which was done two years ago will be released as well as revealing the reason why it had to be put on a hold. According to the iconic bassist, a dispute between himself and Gilmour over a set of liner notes written by Mark Blake was the main issue and he released the notes on his official website in addition to stating that he’s fine with releasing the album without the sleeve notes.

Here is what Waters said in his video:

“This is a message for all you Pink Floyd fans and I know there are one or two of you, these are the two bits of information. One is we have a new mix of ‘Animals’ which we finished about two years ago and it’s been sitting in a cupboard because a chap called Mark Blake wrote some sleeve notes for it which I then helped him correct a little bit.

I thought they were good and should be included on the record David, on the other hand, thought that they were good and they were true but they should not be included in the sleeve notes because he wanted Pink Floyd to remain enigmatic. I’ve decided to agree for the record to be released without those sleeve notes but I’m releasing them now. So the record will come out but with no liner notes on them.”

David Gilmour, however, has a different story than his former bandmate as he revealed during a more recent interview. Pink Floyd icon confirmed that the remix version of ‘Animals’ is completed, yet there’s ‘someone’ who is insisting on having the liner notes included in the album, and when rejected, he’s not allowing it to be released which sounds nothing like Waters said.

Here is what David Gilmour said during the interview:

“Well, a very lovely Animals remix has been done, but someone has tried to force some liner notes on it that I haven’t approved, and, um, someone is digging his heels and not allowing it to be released.“

Due to the fact that the interview also included David Gilmour’s wife Polly Samson, she was curious to know if the band previously had liner notes in their studio albums and Gilmour stated that Pink Floyd has never had them included. That’s when Samson stressed the peculiarity of the situation by asking where the sudden need of having notes came from only to hear the criticism came from her husband towards his former bandmate both of which notoriously haven’t been getting along for years.

Here is what Samson asked:

“Why are you suddenly having liner notes?”

Here is how Gilmour responded:

“Because someone wants them, and they got a journalist to write some, and I didn’t approve them. And he’s just getting a bit shirty. You know how he is, poor boy.”

You can watch the YouTube video below.