| Amused to Death | ||||
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 7 September 1992 | |||
| Recorded | 1987–1992 | |||
| Studio | The Billiard Room (London) Olympic Studios (London) CTS Studios (London) Angel Recording Studios (London) Abbey Road Studios (London) Compass Point Studios (Nassau) Ameraycan Studios (Los Angeles) Johnny Yuma Recording (Burbank) Devonshire Sound Studios (Los Angeles) | |||
| Genre | Progressive rock | |||
| Length | 72:36 | |||
| Label | Columbia | |||
| Producer |
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| Roger Waters chronology | ||||
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| Roger Waters studio chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Amused to Death | ||||
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Amused to Death is the third studio album by the Englishrock musicianRoger Waters, released on 7 September 1992 byColumbia Records. Produced by Waters andPatrick Leonard, it was mixed inQSound to enhance its spatial feel. The album featuresJeff Beck on lead guitar on several tracks. The album's title was inspired byNeil Postman's 1985 bookAmusing Ourselves to Death.
In 2015, the album was remixed and re-released with new artwork and in different formats, including a new 5.1 surround sound mix by original engineerJames Guthrie, assisted by Joel Plante.
Roger Waters started working onAmused to Death in 1987 when he first wrote "Perfect Sense."[2] It was several years before the album was released.
Amused to Death was produced by Waters and Patrick Leonard, with co-production by Nick Griffiths. It was recorded inLondon at The Billiard Room,Olympic Studios, CTS Studios,Angel Recording Studios andAbbey Road Studios. The album was engineered by Hayden Bendall, Jerry Jordan, and Stephen McLaughlan and mixed byJames Guthrie.[3] The album is mixed inQSound to enhance the spatial feel of the audio, and the many sound effects on the album – rifle range ambience, sleigh-bells, cars, planes, distant horses, chirping crickets, and dogs – all make use of the3-D facility.
The album is loosely organized around the idea of an ape randomly switching channels on a television,[4] but explores numerous political and social themes, including critiques of theFirst Gulf War in "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" and "Perfect Sense".
The first track, "The Ballad of Bill Hubbard", features the voice ofWorld War I veteranAlfred Razzell [de]. A member of theRoyal Fusiliers, he describes finding fellow soldier William "Bill" Hubbard (1888-3 May 1917)[5][6] – to whom the album is dedicated – severely wounded on the battlefield during theSecond Battle of Arras. After failed attempts to take him to safety, Razzell is forced to abandon him inno man's land. The tale is continued at the end of the title track, at the very end of the album, providing a coda to the tragic story, with Razzell describing how he finally found peace. The excerpts are fromBBC Television's 1991Everyman documentary, "A Game of Ghosts", marking the 75th anniversary of the start of theBattle of the Somme.[7][8][9] "I found it very moving," Waters remarked. "That original programme confronted the horrors of war and told the real story. It was an example of television taking its responsibilities seriously."[10] The opening track also features the sound of several animals.[4]
The second song, "What God Wants, Part I", follows and contrasts the moving words of Razzell by opening with the TV being tuned instead into an excerpt of a child who says, "I don't mind about the war. That's one of the things I like to watch – if it's a war going on. 'Cos then I know if, um, our side's winning, if our side's losing..." he is then interrupted by the channel being changed and a burst of ape-chatter.
"Perfect Sense" is a two-part song about a world where live transmissions of wars are the main form of entertainment.[2] The first part begins with a loud, unintelligible rant, then a backwards message from Waters: "Julia, however, in the light and visions of the issues ofStanley, we changed our minds. We have decided to include a backward message. Stanley, for you, and for all the other book burners." The message climaxes with Waters yelling in the aggressive Scottish voice he used to depict the teacher inThe Wall. In the second part,sportscasterMarv Albert narrates a war as if it were a basketball game. "My main inspiration behind the song 'Perfect Sense'," Waters explained, "came from thinking about the days of theRoman Empire, when they would flood theColosseum and have fights between rivalgalleys. I've always been intrigued by this notion of war as an entertainment to mollify the folks back home, and theGulf conflict fuelled that idea."[10]
"The Bravery of Being Out of Range" includes a reference to a song written by Waters onPink Floyd's 1977 albumAnimals, "Sheep", and to "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot".[11] In "Sheep" Waters sings, "I've looked over Jordan and I have seen, things are not what they seem"; in "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" he sings "I looked over Jordan and what did I see? I saw a U.S. Marine in a pile of debris."
"Late Home Tonight, Part I", which opens with the song of aEurasian skylark, recalls the1986 US air strike against Libya from the perspective of two "ordinary wives" and a young AmericanF-111 pilot. The lyrics about "when you take the jeans from the refrigerator" reference a 1985Levi's 501 commercial.[12][better source needed]
At the beginning of "What God Wants, Part II"Charles Fleischer (better known as the voice ofRoger Rabbit) performs the greedyteleevangelist's sermon. The lyrics about God wanting silver, gold and "his secret never to be told" reference thenursery rhyme,One for Sorrow. "What God Wants, Part III" musically references the Pink Floyd songs "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Part I)", "Echoes" and "Breathe (In the Air)". It ends with an audio clip of Tom Bromley, an elderly WWI veteran, singing "Wait 'Till the Sun Shines, Nellie"a capella. The clip is also from "A Game of Ghosts".[9]
"Too Much Rope" includes the line, "Each man has his price, Bob, and yours was pretty low." "I would sometimes rehearse vocal takes by impersonatingBob Dylan," Waters explained. "That line originally read, 'Each man has his price, my friends…' – so make of that what you will. As a joke, I sang 'Bob' instead, andPat(Leonard, producer) insisted that we leave it in. So, although it was unintentional, I'm happy that it's there for(Pink Floyd producer)Bob Ezrin. I hope he appreciates it."[10]
The song "Watching TV" (a duet withDon Henley) explores theinfluence of mass media on the Chineseprotests for democracy in Tiananmen Square.
In "It's a Miracle" Waters makes a scathing reference toAndrew Lloyd Webber (whom he would accuse elsewhere of having plagiarised music from Pink Floyd's "Echoes" for sections of the musicalThe Phantom of the Opera):[13] The same song features a sample from the 1977 low-budget zombie filmShock Waves in which the film's characters wrestle over a flashlight.[14] The title track begins with the lyric, "Doctor, Doctor". "Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk" onThe Piper at the Gates of Dawn, the first song written by Waters, opens with the same line.
Waters stated in aRockline interview on February 8, 1993, that he had wanted to use dialogue samples from2001: A Space Odyssey on the album, specificallyHAL 9000's 'dying' monologue.Stanley Kubrick, the film's director, turned him down on the basis that it would open the door to many other people using the sound sample.[15] Others think that Kubrick refused because Pink Floyd had not allowed him to use music fromAtom Heart Mother in his filmA Clockwork Orange.[16] Waters did use the samples of HAL describing his mind being taken away when performing live – specifically at the beginning of "Perfect Sense, Part I" during hisIn the Flesh tour, after Kubrick's death, and it was finally incorporated into theAmused to Death album for the 2015 remaster / remix release.
The album's title was inspired byNeil Postman's bookAmusing Ourselves to Death. In Postman's later bookThe End of Education, he remarks on the album:[17][18]
Roger Waters, once the lead singer of Pink Floyd, was sufficiently inspired by a book of mine to produce a CD calledAmused to Death. This fact so elevated my prestige among undergraduates that I am hardly in a position to repudiate him or his kind of music. Nor do I have the inclination for any other reason. Nonetheless, the level of sensibility required to appreciate the music of Roger Waters is both different and lower than what is required to appreciate, let us say, a Chopin étude.
The album's original artwork features achimpanzee watching television in reference to Kubrick's film2001: A Space Odyssey.[18] The image on the television is a gigantic eyeball staring at the viewer.[18] According to Waters, the ape was "a symbol for anyone who's been sitting with his mouth open in front of the network and cable news for the last 10 years."[2]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [19] |
| Chicago Tribune |  [20] |
| Drowned in Sound | 8/10[21] |
| Entertainment Weekly | A–[22] |
| Los Angeles Times | [23] |
| Paste | 8.0/10[24] |
| PopMatters | 8/10[25] |
| Record Collector | [26] |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | [27] |
| Spectrum Culture | [28] |
AllMusic described the album as "a masterpiece in the sense that it brings together all of his obsessions in one grand, but not unwieldy, package".[19]Record Collector wrote that the album shows Waters "at his most bleakly inspired since the cautionary parable ofThe Wall".[26] However, theLos Angeles Times was less favorable, writing "The result is blurred structure (partly improved by the moving old-soldier's tale Waters uses as a framing device), too much repetition and a certain distance and overintellectualization. [...] overall there's a dearth of the good oldpop-rock appeal that always lifted the better Pink Floyd records."[23] A negative review came fromChicago Tribune, writing "self-importance doesn't equal profundity, and the world's most mind-blowing engineering couldn't cover up the deterioration of Waters' singing and melodic sense since his days with Floyd."[20]Ultimate Classic Rock includedAmused to Death on their list "Top 100 90's Rock Albums".[29]
Waters toldClassic Rock: "My view is that I've been involved in two absolutely classic albums –The Dark Side of the Moon andThe Wall [...] And if you haven't gotAmused to Death, you haven't got the full set. So this album [In the Flesh – Live] – the live one, which pulls together songs from all three albums – hopefully redresses the balance."[citation needed] On 19 September 2013, Waters told BBC HardTalk thatAmused to Death has been completely underrated.[30][31]
On 15 April 2015, Waters announced that the album would be remastered and reissued on 24 July 2015 featuring a new 5.1 multichannel audio mix, as well as a new stereo mix. It was made available in a number of formats, including CD,SACD,Blu-ray and high-resolution downloads.[32] In a review of the 2015 remastering of the album, journalist J.C. Maçek III of Spectrum Culture wrote that "Not every album can be a masterpiece, but Waters has stated thatAmused to Death is an underrated effort that serves as a third part toDark Side of the Moon andThe Wall. But it's nowhere near those other albums. The 2015 remastering makes it a good sounding album, but it's just not the kind of infinitely listenable album that Waters is capable of creating."[28] In its review of the 2015 reissue,PopMatters wrote: "not only hasAmused to Death aged well musically, it has unfortunately aged well thematically too. [...]Amused to Death was and still is a powerful statement from one of rock music's most literate misanthropes. As time goes on, it gets harder and harder to believe that it slipped under everyone's radar so thoroughly."[25]Drowned in Sound wrote: "Amused to Death stands up on its own as one of the better, more intriguing post-Floyd records".[21]
In 2016Amused to Death won theGrammy Award for Best Surround Sound Album at the58th Annual Grammy Awards. The winners were listed as follows:"James Guthrie, surround mix engineer; James Guthrie & Joel Plante, surround mastering engineers; James Guthrie, surround producer (Roger Waters)Label: Columbia/Legacy"
Amused to Death reached No. 8 on theUK Albums Chart, Waters' first Top 10 as a solo artist in his homeland, and a career high of No. 21 on theBillboard 200, aided by "What God Wants, Part I", which hit No. 4 onBillboard'sMainstream Rock Tracks chart in 1992. It was also certified Gold by theBritish Phonographic Industry for selling over 100,000 units, which became his first and only studio album to be certified Gold in his home country.[33]
All songs written by Roger Waters.
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "The Ballad of Bill Hubbard" | 4:21 |
| 2. | "What God Wants, Part I" | 6:00 |
| 3. | "Perfect Sense, Part I" | 4:15 |
| 4. | "Perfect Sense, Part II" | 2:51 |
| 5. | "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" | 4:45 |
| 6. | "Late Home Tonight, Part I" | 4:01 |
| 7. | "Late Home Tonight, Part II" | 2:13 |
| 8. | "Too Much Rope" | 5:47 |
| 9. | "What God Wants, Part II" | 3:40 |
| 10. | "What God Wants, Part III" | 4:09 |
| 11. | "Watching TV" | 6:06 |
| 12. | "Three Wishes" | 6:52 |
| 13. | "It's a Miracle" | 8:30 |
| 14. | "Amused to Death" | 9:07 |
| Total length: | 72:36 | |
Production
Original release
| 2015 reissue
|
| Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
|---|---|---|
| Australia (ARIA)[52] | Gold | 35,000^ |
| Canada (Music Canada)[53] | Gold | 50,000^ |
| United Kingdom (BPI)[54] | Gold | 100,000‡ |
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone. | ||
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