The Wall, an award winning film and one of Pink Floyd's best albums is a topic of conversation among people the world over. A visit to YouTube not only brings up music videos and the entire film, but also many parodies. It was on this day, January 24, 1980, that Pink Floyd began an advertising campaign for the album.
To promote their newest release a billboard on Sunset Strip was created. The billboard depicted a plain white wall, but every day another brick was removed from it to eventually reveal the inside spread of the album and its title.
Released officially in 1979, The Wall, is considered a concept album. It can be found among the best in listings across the music industry. The underlying story of the music, which inspires and later creates the film, centers on a rock star's descent into madness through isolation. In a 2011 interview with Absolute Radio, Roger Waters explained that the concept of the album came about from his experience with audiences who were more concerned with getting drunk than listening to the music and their boorish behavior. He also spoke about spitting upon a fan in Montreal and how it affected him:
...some guy in Olympic Stadium in Montreal when we were playing there on the Animal's tour came scrabbling up to the front of the stage and I spat at him. I don't know if I hit him or not. I hope I didn't, because it was an awful thing to do. And, I was so disgusted with myself afterwards I went through a long period of soul searching, but out of that particular incident came the idea of actually doing a show and building a wall across the front of the stage to express my feelings of alienation...
Thirty-four years later both the album and subsequent film remain very popular. Grammy nominations, BAFTA awards, a Juno Award, unique advertising and millions of fans have set a place in music history for Pink Floyd and The Wall.
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