David Gilmour Reveals His 5 Favorite Pink Floyd Songs

Like most progressive-rock fans there is, David Gilmour is also quite sure that Pink Floyd’s songs are the best of all time. He recalls having a lot of favorites in every album era, but we’ve rounded up to these 5 tracks that truly marked Gilmour’s passion with his group’s repertoire.

“Comfortably Numb” – The Wall (1979)

“I remember having the flu or something, an infection with a temperature of 105 and being delirious,” Roger Waters once revealed. “It wasn’t like the hands looked like balloons, but they looked way too big, frightening. A lot of people think those lines are about masturbation. God knows why.” The unnerving song “Comfortably Numb” is part of the greater narrative of Pink Floyd’s 11th album The Wall, which revolved around a shattered and alienated rock star named Pink, who was inspired by Waters’ reaction to a muscle relaxant he was taken after catching hepatitis during the band’s In the Flesh Tour.

“Shine On You Crazy Diamond” – Wish You Were Here (1975)

Wish You Were Here is best summed up with “Shine On You Crazy Diamond,” a nine-part homage to Barrett penned by Gilmour, Waters, and Wright. Barrett dropped into the band’s session at Abbey Road Studios to listen to them fine-tune the final mix of Wish You Were Here, a song specifically composed for him.

“Echoes” – Meddle (1971)

Meddle is Pink Floyd’s sixth studio album, and “Echoes,” the album’s sixth and last track, spans the full duration of the album’s second side at over 23 and a half minutes. Roger Waters’ lyrics in “Echoes” explore human relationships via a medley of contrasting musical ideas.

“The Great Gig In The Sky” – The Dark Side of the Moon (1973)

With its noises, spoken word, vocals, and entire tracks, Dark Side of the Moon explores themes including greed, mortality, mental health, and the passage of time. Clare Torry, a studio vocalist, and the late Pink Floyd keyboardist Richard Wright wrote “The Great Gig In The Sky.” The song had gone through multiple revisions with the band before Torry walked in, and she ended up performing the vocals without lyrics.

“Wish You Were Here” – Wish You Were Here (1975)

According to Gilmour, “Wish You Were Here” is also connected to the band’s founding member Syd Barrett, even though the song deals with several issues, including absence, withdrawal, and living a fuller life. Before his death from pancreatic cancer in 2006, singer, guitarist, and early composer Barrett quit the band in 1968 and battled mental health concerns.