Pink Floyd bootleg recordings

Pink Floyd bootleg recordings are the collections of audio and video recordings of musical performances by the British rock band Pink Floyd, which were never officially released by the band. The recordings consist of both live performances and outtakes from studio sessions unavailable in official releases. In some cases, certain bootleg recordings may be highly prized among collectors, as at least 40 songs composed by Pink Floyd have never been officially released.
During the 1970s, bands such as Pink Floyd created a lucrative market for the mass production of unofficial recordings with large followings of fans willing to purchase them. In addition, the huge crowds that turned up to these concerts made the effective policing of the audience for the presence of recording equipment virtually impossible. Vast numbers of recordings were issued for profit by bootleg labels.
Some Pink Floyd bootlegs exist in several variations with differing sound quality and length because sometimes listeners have recorded different versions of the same performance at the same time. Pink Floyd was a group that protected its sonic performance, making recording with amateur recording devices difficult. In their career, Pink Floyd played over 1,300 concerts, of which more than 350 were released as bootlegged recordings (sometimes in various versions). Few concerts have ever been broadcast (or repeated once they were broadcast on television), especially during 'the golden age' of the group from 1966 to 1981.
Pink Floyd was one of the mainstays of the bootleg industry in the 1970s. In 1999, the group was mentioned on BPI's list of most bootlegged British artists of all time.
One of the best known ROIO's by Pink Floyd is "Best of Tour '72: Live at the Rainbow Theatre" with a concert performed on 20 February 1972. This bootleg includes one of the first performances of "The Dark Side of the Moon". One year and one month before the official release of that same album, the bootleg had already sold over 120,000 copies.
In 2008, the Pink Floyd bootleg "Madison Square Garden, New York, NY – 2 July 1977" was mentioned on the Yahoo's "Top 10 of Best Bootlegs of All Time".
Earliest bootlegs.
Most of Pink Floyd's early bootlegs concern performances from the European A Saucerful of Secrets Tour and the A Saucerful of Secrets US Tour. Most of these bootlegs were released by the label "Ace Bootlegs Production".
In January 1996, the label See For Miles Records released the bootleg album "Psychedelic Games for May" which includes a collection of Syd Barrett era Floyd, featuring a pre-Floyd acetate, rough mixes of the early singles plus BBC TV and the unreleased single "Scream Thy Last Scream".
As late as 2004, a bootleg album entitled "Outtakes From Outer Space" emerged from Israel on the dubious-sounding "Hippie Shit Label", featuring a compilation of studio session recordings and outtakes, some mentioned above. The track listing was:
1969.
During the two one-week recording sessions in November and December 1969 of the soundtrack for Michelangelo Antonioni's "Zabriskie Point" at International Recording in Rome, Pink Floyd experienced for the first time a studio leak. Three out-takes appeared on a bootleg album "Omay Yad", also known under titles as "Oneone", "Fingal's Cave" and "Rain in the Country".
With the advent of a 1997 deluxe reissue of the movie soundtrack on a double compact disc, four previously unreleased Pink Floyd out-takes were also revealed. Almost simultaneously, a 15-track bootleg CD of the complete sessions appeared that revealed additional works in progress, among them a track that was long referred to by Pink Floyd as "The Violent Sequence". It was penned by Richard Wright for a riot scene in the movie and although unreleased in any form officially, was incorporated into their live set as an acoustic piano piece in the early part of the year. It was a forerunner to the melody of "Us and Them", which featured on their 1973 album "The Dark Side of the Moon".
1971.
At least 34 bootlegs of different concerts from 1971 were released (not counting the several bootlegs of each concert).
Dark Side of the Moon Tour.
Sometimes the smaller record mastering and pressing plants simply hid the bootleg work when record company executives would come around (in which case the printed label could show the artist and song names) and other times they would print labels with fictitious names. For example, the 1972 Pink Floyd bootleg called "Brain Damage" was released under the name The Screaming Abdabs.
In January 1972, Pink Floyd debuted the live performance of their album "The Dark Side of the Moon" before its release. A lot of Pink Floyd bootlegs date back from this period. Most of these bootlegs contain a pre-release version of the whole album.
1973.
The bootleg "Supine in the Sunshine" contains an audience live recording with extended versions of two songs from the soundtrack "Obscured by Clouds" (1972); namely the title track (5:38) and "When You're In" (7:48).
"Yeeshkul!" is so named because the bootlegger, or someone close to him, mentions the word several times during the performance. The name has inspired a forum for discussing Pink Floyd bootlegs.
Pink Floyd 1974 tours.
The bootleg "British Winter Tour", a recording of the 19 November show in Stoke-on-Trent was a notable bootleg released in 1975. It featured the three new songs that Pink Floyd were playing on that tour. It sold an estimated 50,000 copies. The record was issued with the lyrics to the songs, and the quality of presentation convinced a number of buyers that the album was a "bona fide" follow-up to "The Dark Side of the Moon". The British Phonographic Industry were not impressed, and attempted to find out who the bootleggers were, with the intent of prosecuting them.
In the Flesh Tour (1977).
The bootleg "Animals Instincts" concerns the recording of the Pink Floyd concert at 9 May 1977, at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland.
2000s.
The classic line up of Pink Floyd (David Gilmour, Roger Waters, Richard Wright and Nick Mason) played together on stage for the first time in 24 years (the band toured without Waters in 1987–1989 and 1994).
The band performed the songs "Speak to Me", "Breathe / Breathe (Reprise)", "Money", "Wish You Were Here" and "Comfortably Numb". They were the only band not to be verbally introduced; instead the house and stage lights were darkened while the introduction to "Speak to Me" was played, accompanied on the video screens by an animated version of the heart monitor graphic from "The Dark Side of the Moon" sleeve. Due to the death of Richard Wright in September 2008, this would be the only reunion of all four members of the post-Syd Barrett incarnation of the band.
Recent releases.
The bootleg label The Godfather released in March 2011 an 8-CD box set of Pink Floyd songs called "The Complete Rainbow Tapes". The box contains four Pink Floyd shows, recorded at the Rainbow Theater in London (17–20 February 1972).
In 2012 The Godfather label released a 10-CD box set of Pink Floyd songs called "The Massed Gadgets of Hercules 1970–1974". The box contains five Pink Floyd shows, recorded at 14 March 1970, Live at Meistersingerhalle, Nürnberg, West Germany / 13 February 1971, Live at Students Union Bar, TechnicalCollege, Farnborough, Hampshire, England / 16 April 1972, Live at Township Auditorium, Columbia, South Carolina, USA / 12 October 1973, Live at Olympiahalle, München, West Germany / 14 December 1974, Live at Colston Hall, Bristol, Somerset, England.