It’s an enduring friendship that dates back to more than 50 years ago. Roxy Music’s iconic guitarist Phil Manzanera and Pink Floyd former mainstay and six-string hero David Gilmour first crossed paths in the 1960s when Manzanera was an up-and-coming teenage guitarist.
Over the course of the ensuing decades, their friendship developed to the point where they came together musically to collaborate. Gilmour would transform one of Manzanera’s demo tracks into the song “One Slip,” from Pink Floyd’s 1987 album, A Momentary Lapse of Reason.
Manzanera would go on to co-produce David Gilmour’s 2006 album, On an Islandand 2015’s Rattle That Lockas well as contribute additional acoustic guitar on several tracks, and he was one of the producers of Pink Floyd’s 2014 outing, The Endless River.
“I had first met David when I was 16 and then I followed his career,” Manzanera recalls today. “And when I got into Roxy Music five years later, I reconnected with him when I heard Chris Thomas mixing the Dark Side of the Moon album at Air Studios in London, where we were doing our second Roxy Music album.
“I went in to the control room of Studio Two, and none of the Floyd were there. It was just Chris, and he played me the song ‘Money.’ And when I heard the guitar solo, I thought, Jesus, this is amazing!
“So I sent David a telegram saying, ‘Remember me? I’m in a band now called Roxy Music’ and we reestablished contact. So I have known him a hell of a long time.”
Having become part of Gilmour’s inner circle, Manzanera got to witness his development as a guitar player, from close quarters.
“I watched his style evolve really all along,” he says. “I remember the first time I heard the guitar solo from ‘Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2,’ I thought, Geez, how the hell did he do that?
“And the sound, and the tone? (Pink Floyd founder and guitarist) Syd Barrett was more off the wall and experimental, and not so blues oriented. But David brought a sort of blues sensibility to Pink Floyd and then had to do the experimental stuff as well too. So he evolved in his own way of creating weird and wonderful sounds.”
When Gilmour decided to enter the studio to record his third solo album, 2006’s On an Islandhe called on his friend to assist in its production as well as contribute guitar to three tracks. Manzanera later joined Gilmour’s touring band for the record, all of which gave him insights into Gilmour’s precise playing technique.
“One of the things about David’s playing — and in some way it’s a bit like me — is that while it seems to be about distortion and echo, it is actually about the way he plays the notes and bends them, along with the strength of his hands,” he reveals.
“And he’s got a fantastic sense of tuning. He’s very, very hot on tuning. So often when I was recording him, I would have a tuner right there with me to check on the tuning. But he would come in to listen to a take or something, and if a note wasn’t bent or pulled or pushed to the right tuning, he’d want to redo it.”
Manzanera says this could be a problem at time.
“People who have perfect pitch — and I don’t know if he has it — but for those who do, it becomes a bit of a problem. You’re going to be either under the note or above the note.
“And because I was brought up listening to people like Miles Davis, tuning for me is about the space in between the intervals, which interests me just as much. It doesn’t have to be perfectly in tune, but it drives some people mad — obviously those who have perfect pitch.
Manzanera says that while Gilmour is a master of the guitar, he is also highly adept at playing the lap steel.
“His use of the lap steel is quite unique as well,” he says. “There’s no one else who can do that in that kind of musical context. It is not country music, nor is it super high-driven steel-string playing. But again, because he’s got this great sense of tuning, he can find the spot. It’s like when you’re playing slide, but sitting down and playing in the sort of melodic bluesy way. So, he adapted that. And that’s pretty damn unique, I think.”
Gilmour’s search for perfection runs deep. It not only takes precedent when it comes to playing the guitar but underscores every aspect of the writing and recording process.
“He has a guitar palette that he tends to use,” Manzanera explains. “Sometimes in his demos, he will just use a Zoom digital recorder and will D.I. it and get this great sound. But then when we’d be in the studio, we’d spend ages with all sorts of valve amps and expensive stuff trying to recreate the Zoom demo.
“Because he’s doing the demos himself — and he’s very adept at doing that — he gets used to the sound of what’s on the demo, and he’ll like it. And I will always say, ‘If it sounds good, that’s it.’ You just have to trust your ears and things like that.
“And that’s how we would work together, finding the place between the demo and what became the finished product. Because David knows what he wants.”
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