Bob Marley charted with “No Woman, No Cry”

No Woman, No Cry Bob Marley & the Wailers

Writer(s): Bob Marley, Vincent Ford (see lyrics here) First Charted: September 27, 1975 Peak: 1 CL, 1 CO, 8 UK, 97 AU, 3 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.) Sales (in millions): 0.68 US, 0.4 UK, 1.08 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 343.6 video, 195.84 streaming

Awards: Click on award for more details.

About the Song: There’s an argument to be made that no artist did more for his genre than Bob Marley did for reggae. In 1975, the genre “had been bubbling out of Jamaica through white rock & roll for three years or so” TC but “was confined to…Jamaica…and a few white fans.” TC “Partly it was the politics and the Rastafarianism that put the public off reggae music at first,” TC but music critic Toby Creswell argues that Bob Marley & the Wailers’ 1975 live gig at London’s Lyceum on July 18-19 “was a turning point in the history of music.” TC Their previous tour didn’t go well because non-Jamaican audiences didn’t appreciate pure reggae, but after Marley and his band tightened their sound, they received glowing reviews and sold out shows in America. By the time they got to London, they were a huge success SF attracting an audience that was half black and half white, some who were avid followers of reggae and some who were just curious. LW Steve Smith, who co-produced the live recording, said of the first night that “the intensity and the vibe were just nuts.” TC As a result, the second night’s show was recorded. The result was what Smith asserted to be one of only three great live albums, alongside Ray Charles at Newport in 1958 and James Brown at the Apollo in 1962. TC The highlight of the show was arguably “No Woman, No Cry,” “the ultimate sing-along” TC in which Marley “merges the personal, the political and the spiritual.” LW The original studio version appeared on the 1974 Natty Dread album, but the live version released from the Lyceum album was a top-10 hit in the UK, thanks to Island Records marketing Marley “as a new breed of Third World rebel.” LW The title has been misinterpreted as “if there is no woman, there is no reason to cry,” WK but the real message is “woman, don’t cry.” WK The narrator is “leaving and reassuring here that the slum they live in won’t get her down.” SF Critic Paul Williams said, “Song in general, song in its truest form, creates a willingness to hear by its attractive qualities; it captures, holds, and reshapes the attention of its listener, through its sincerity and integrity it opens up to new truth.” PW “This transcendently beautiful song” PW “cuts clean to the heart of the matter in a few words, a few notes, a few moments of vibrant soul-stirring clarity.” PW “Vocalist/preacher Marley takes on the classic…masculine role of father, husband, elder brother, offering strength and hope to daughter/wife/sister.” PW The “humble radiant wild holy man” PW “gave us something that makes a difference in our struggle. He reminds us of the dignity of our lives.” PW In a display of his own dignity, Marley gave Vincent Ford a songwriter credit so that royalties would support his friend’s soup kitchen in Trenchtown, Jamaica. WK Resources: TC Toby Creswell (2005). 1001 Songs: The Great Songs of All Time. Pages 855-6. LW Alan Lewens (2001). Popular Song – Soundtrack of the Century. Billboard Books: New York, NY. Page 135. SF Songfacts WK Wikipedia PW Paul Williams (1993). Rock and Roll: The Best 100 Singles. New York, NY: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. Pages 161-2. Related Links: First posted 4/13/2021; last updated 11/24/2022.

Pink Floyd released Wish You Were Here

Wish You Were Here Pink Floyd

Released: September 15, 1975 Peak: 12 US, 11 UK, 14 CN, 14 AU, 14 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): 6.0 US, 0.6 UK, 21.3 world (includes US and UK), 33.43 EAS Genre: classic rock

Tracks: Click on a song titled for more details. Shine on You Crazy Diamond (Parts I-V) [13:32] Welcome to the Machine [7:28] Have a Cigar [5:08] Wish You Were Here [5:35] Shine on You Crazy Diamond (Parts VI-IX) [12:28] Total Running Time: 44:11 The Players: David Gilmour (vocals, guitar) Roger Waters (vocals, bass) Richard Wright (piano, keyboards) Nick Mason (drums, percussion)

Rating: 4.557 out of 5.00 (average of 29 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album Pink Floyd had been around since the mid-‘60s, finally scoring their commercial breakthrough with 1973’s Dark Side of the Moon. In the wake of Dark Side’s monstrous success, the band were left drained and stressed by the pressure to match it. Singer/songwriter and bassist Roger Waters described the early attempts to record a follow-up as “torturous.” WK Both he and drummer Nick Mason were suffering through marriages which eventually ended in divorce. Singer/guitarist David Gilmour quarreled with Waters over the band’s musical direction and was frustrated with the “general malaise and sense of apathy.” WK However, in the midst of “these volatile relationships, Waters found his grand theme for Wish You Were Here: the music business itself, and its tendency to crush the dreams of those who pursue fame, fortune and a chance at creative self-expression.” GW It gave him leeway to explore his frustration with the band’s disintegrating camaraderie and the drug-induced mental breakdown of Syd Barrett, one of the band’s founders and its original frontman. Barrett had cracked under the pressure of stardom and Waters painted him as “a messianic martyr to the soulless mechanisms of the music biz.” GW The cover art, which featured two businessmen – one on fire – shaking hands, reflected the idea of people hiding their real feelings out of fear of getting burned. WK Wish “takes everything the band learned in the studio on Dark Side…to the next level.” IGN “The long, winding soundscapes are constantly enthralling” AM and make the album “warmer than its predecessor.” AM The album “is big and ambitious, even bombastic, [but] dodges being pretentious – the Barrett tributes are honest and heartfelt, beneath all the grand gestures and stereophonic trickery.” AZ The album may even be more more impressive musically than Dark Side as it showcases “the group’s interplay and…Gilmour’s solos in particular.” AM He gets “lots of space for his most lyrical guitar playing ever” AZ and he “shoot[s] rays of light and glimpses of hope throughout the album.” GW The band once again made effective use of synthesizers and studio effects to create a production that was “sparkling, convoluted, [and] designed to sound deeply oh-wow under the influence – and pretty great sober too.” AZ Gilmour and keyboardist Richard Wright have both declared Wish You Were Here their favorite Pink Floyd album. WK Conclusion The album didn’t initially receive uniformly positive critical praise, but was an immediate commercial success. It went straight to the top of the UK charts with advance orders of 250,000. In the U.S., the album’s 900,000 in advance orders were the largest ever for a Columbia release. WK Legend has it that Barrett made a surprise visit to the studio during the recording of the album. While the band were completing a final mix of “Shine On,” an overweight man with his head and eyebrows shaved entered the room. Initially the band didn’t recognize him. Mason recalled in Inside Out (2005) that Barrett’s conversation was “desultory and not entirely sensible.” WK Storm Thorgerson echoed Mason, saying, Barrett “He sat round and talked for a bit but he wasn’t really there.’” WK Barrett showed up again at Gilmour’s wedding reception, left without saying goodbye, and wasn’t seen again by any of the band. The Songs Here’s a breakdown of each of the individual songs.

Shine on You Crazy Diamond (Parts I-IX) Pink Floyd

Writer(s): David Gilmour, Richard Wright, Roger Waters Released: Part 1: B-side of “Have a Cigar” (11/15/1975), Wish You Were Here (9/15/1975), A Collection of Great Dance Songs (compilation, 11/23/1981), Delicate Sound of Thunder (live, 11/22/1988), Pulse (live, 5/29/1995), In the Flesh (Roger Waters live, 12/5/2000), Echoes (compilation, 11/6/2001), A Foot in the Door (compilation, 11/7/2011), This Is Not a Drill (Roger Waters live, 8/1/2025) Peak: 2 CL, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 260.54 (Parts I-V), 72.78 (Parts VI-IX) streaming

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Song: “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” kicks off the Wish You Were Here album with more than eight minutes of instrumentation before the listener gets any lyrics. It ranks among Gilmour’s “greatest guitar work.” GW Gilmour stumbled across the phrase, but with Water’s positive encouragement, the song was fleshed into the album’s centerpiece. When its two halves are taken together as a whole, the mostly-instrumental twenty-minute piece is similar to the band’s earlier work “Echoes.” The opening four-note guitar phrase reminded Waters of Barrett, so the song became one of “two, long touching [songs] about the band’s vanished friend.” AZ He is fondly recalled via phrases like “Remember when you were young, you shone like the sun” and “You reached for the secret too soon, you cried for the moon.” Waters said the song wasn’t really about Syd, but that he was “a symbol for all the extremes of absence some people have to indulge in because it’s the only way they can cope.” WK

Welcome to the Machine Pink Floyd

Writer(s): Roger Waters Released: Wish You Were Here (9/15/1975), In the Flesh (Roger Waters live, 12/5/2000), Delicate Sound of Thunder (live, 2019 reissue), Us + Them (Roger Waters live, 10/2/2020) Peak: 2 CL, 13 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 116.25 streaming About the Song: The “ominous” GW Welcome to the Machine “begins with the opening of a door – described by Waters as a symbol of musical discovery and progress betrayed by a music industry more interested in greed and success. The song ends with sounds from a party, epitomising ‘the lack of contact and real feelings between people’.” WK

Have a Cigar Pink Floyd with Roy Harper

Writer(s): Roger Waters Released: single (11/15/1975), Wish You Were Here (9/15/1975), A Foot in the Door (compilation, 11/7/2011), This Is Not a Drill (Roger Waters live, 8/1/2025) B-side: “Shine on You Crazy Diamond (Part 1)” Peak: 2 CL, 7 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, -- video, 201.11 streaming About the Song: Both that song and the “unctuously disquieting” GW Have a Cigar “rank among Waters’ darkest compositions.” GW Like “Machine,” it lambasts the music business and works with “Shine On” to offer “an apt summary of the rise and fall of Barrett.” WK It also humorously asks “By the way, which one is Pink?,” a question frequently asked of the band. Thanks to Waters’ limited vocal range and the stress he’d already caused his voice recording “Shine On,” Gilmour was asked to sing the song. When he declined, friend Roy Harper was tapped – a move Waters later regretted as he believed he should have sung it himself. WK

Wish You Were Here Pink Floyd

Writer(s): David Gilmour, Roger Waters (see lyrics here) Released: single (11/20/1975), single – live version (7/20/1995), Wish You Were Here (9/15/1975), A Collection of Great Dance Songs (compilation, 11/23/1981), Delicate Sound of Thunder (live, 11/22/1988), Pulse (live, 5/29/1995), In the Flesh (Roger Waters live, 12/5/2000), Echoes (compilation, 11/6/2001), A Foot in the Door (compilation, 11/7/2011), Us + Them (Roger Waters live, 10/2/2020), This Is Not a Drill (Roger Waters live, 8/1/2025) Peak: 1 CL, 13 AR, 68 UK, 1 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- US, 0.60 UK, 0.75 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 455.40 video, 696.71 streaming

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Song: Pink Floyd’s ninth album’s “overall theme is absence.” DT Accounts vary as to the inspiration for the album’s title cut, but the general consensus is that it is inspired by the band’s founder and frontman Syd Barrett, who departed the band in 1968 because of problems with LSD and schizophrenia. One story says the song emerged from a poem that songwriter and bassist Roger Waters wrote for Barrett. DT However, it isn’t just a reflection on Barrett but Waters’ own nature as both an idealist and domineering personality. WK Waters has said the song was about “being present in one’s own life and freeing one’s self in order to truly experience life.” WK He “seems keenly aware of the dangers of falling over the edge.” GW He’s also said the song was “about his grandmother’s final years and how she would think Waters was her long-dead husband.” XFM Any interpretation allows for the song to be viewed as “a commentary on how people cope with the world by withdrawing physically, mentally, or emotionally.” SF In addition, “the sighing introspection of the music sums up the mundane tragedy perfectly.” XFM The album version of the song opens with the sound oa radio station being tuned away from “Have a Cigar,” the previous song on the Wish You Were Here album. The listener flips through several stations including a piece of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony before moving on to the beginning of “Wish You Were Here” playing on the radio. The latter was recorded from singer and guitarist David Gilmour’s car radio. WK He performs “the delicate acoustic guitar intro” XFM as if he is playing along with the radio. The original version of the song was released as a single in 1975. Twenty years, later it was released again as a single in support of Pink Floyd’s 1995 live album Pulse. The latter version reached #13 on Billboard’s mainstream rock chart. In 2001, Wyclef Jean released a “soul-reggae version” SF which reached #28 in the UK. In 2012, Ed Sheeran and others performed the song at the closing ceremony of the Summer Olympics in London and hit #34 on the chart. It prompted the original Pink Floyd version to hit the UK charts for the first time the next week at #68. In 2016, Avenged Sevenfold took the song to #16 on the mainstream rock chart. Guns N’ Roses performed the song live in 2017 in a medley with Derek & the Dominos’ “Layla.” One of the most significant covers, however, was in the wake of the 9/11 tragedy. Limp Bizkit’s Fred Durst and Wes Borland performed the song live with the Goo Goo Dolls’ Johnny Reznik on the America: A Tribute to Heroes telethon. They revised some lyrics for the occasion. The version simultaneously captured the sadness over American lives lost and the desire to seek revenge on Osama bin Laden for orchestrating the 9/11 attacks.

Resources/References: AM AllMusic.com review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine AZ Amazon.com review by Douglas Wolk GW Guitar World (2/19/2009). “50 Greatest Guitar Albums” IGN IGN.com (3/30/2007). “Top 25 Classic Rock Albums” by Spence D. SF Songfacts page for “Wish You Were Here” DT Dave Thompson (2011). 1000 Songs That Rock Your World. Krause Publications: Iola, WI. Page 91. WK Wikipedia page for Wish You Were Here album WK Wikipedia page for “Wish You Were Here” song XFM Mike Walsh (editor) (2010). The XFM Top 1000 Songs of All Time. Elliott & Thompson Limited: London, England. Page 314. Related DMDB Pages: First posted 3/22/2008; last updated 9/5/2025.