Remembering Richard Wright Of Pink Floyd

A tribute to the often-underrated musician

Musician Richard “Rick” Wright (July 28, 1943-September 15, 2008) is best known for his work as a keyboardist and songwriter with Pink Floyd, of which he was a founding member.

When Rick died, it seemed that most of the tributes to him focused primarily on his writing of the music for the songs “The Great Gig In The Sky” and “Us And Them,” both from the band’s most famous album, “The Dark Side Of The Moon.” Also frequently mentioned was his work on the extended instrumental sections of the fantastic “Wish You Were Here” album. While I certainly agree with the accolades he justly received for those works, Richard Wright often doesn’t get the credit he deserves for some of his lesser-known songs with the band.

While I love the songs sung by Pink Floyd’s two primary lead vocalists, David Gilmour and Roger Waters, I’ve always been especially fond of the far more infrequent songs which featured Rick Wright on lead vocals or co-lead vocals. Most of them took place before the “Dark Side Of The Moon” album in 1973. Rick famously sang part of the lead vocals on the famous song “Time” from that album. However, despite the success of that song, his next lead vocal for the band wouldn’t happen for another 21 years.

I’ve always thought that was a shame. I would have liked to have heard more songs that showcased him. Richard Wright’s voice was unique and had a very cool sound to it. I especially like when he and David Gilmour would share the lead vocals on certain songs. They always harmonized perfectly together.

Here are some of my favorite performances by Richard Wright, starting from his early days with Pink Floyd, up to two incredible live performances he did with David Gilmour shortly before his death.

“Paintbox” was released in late 1967 as the B-side of their “Apples And Oranges” single. Neither song was very successful, but I think “Paintbox” is a perfect song. Despite being a big fan of the band, I never knew until today that this fun music video existed. While doing a little research, I also learned that this was the first appearance on film of David Gilmour (lead guitar) performing with the band. I love discovering neat little trivia like that.

“It Would Be So Nice” was a single released by the band in 1968. It was written and sung by Rick. I would guess that most people hearing this for the first time would not guess that it was a Pink Floyd song. It’s much more pop-sounding than most of their works. This quick change in their sound was primarily because of pressure from their record label to create a pop song that could become a hit on the radio. Well, that didn’t work, and the song was unsuccessful when it was released. It was never included on any of the band’s studio albums, but it is available on some of their later compilation albums. I love the pop music sound of “It Would Be So Nice.” I think it’s a catchy and fun song. Note: The above version is very short and not the complete version of the song. However, I included the full version in the Spotify playlist posted at the end of this article.

“Summer ‘68” from the “Atom Heart Mother” album. The first thing I feel like writing here is the word “love,” because I love, love, love this song! Fantastic vocals and music on this track. One of the things I find especially interesting about “Summer ‘68” is that there are parts of it that sound very reminiscent of The Beatles and The Beach Boys, especially the latter. A prime example of this can be found 1:24 into the song. The vocals there remind me a bit of how The Beach Boys sounded on their song “Good Vibrations.”

“Burning Bridges” from the great “Obscured By Clouds” album, which is one of my favorite albums from the band. Gilmour and Wright sing together on this great mellow tune and they sound fantastic. I especially love Richard’s vocals on the second verse.

“Stay,” which is also from the “Obscured By Clouds” album. Lyrically, it’s very similar to “Summer ‘68” from above, in that Rick seems to be singing about wild one-night-stands in both songs. Now, I want to be clear (especially to my wife if she’s reading this) that I do NOT condone (or participate in) that kind of behavior. But hey, maybe Rick didn’t either. Maybe it’s just fiction for the songs. Whatever, man. I don’t judge.

Like “Summer ‘68,” “Stay” is just a darned good song. Fantastic vocals from Rick and the music is so good that it’s almost hypnotic.

As I mentioned above, “Time” is from their 1973 album “The Dark Side Of The Moon.” However, the above music video is a live performance of the song, recorded sometime during their 1994/1995 tour for their album “The Division Bell.” I may not have been at this particular show, but I did see them on that tour when they played in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

I was also lucky enough to see them twice on their previous tour for their “A Momentary Lapse Of Reason” album. They were fantastic all three times. I think the above live performance is a good example of how amazing they were as a live band.

“Wearing The Inside Out” was the song I was referring to earlier when I said it was 21 years after “Time” before Rick would sing lead on another Pink Floyd song. The studio version of the song appeared on their album “The Division Bell” in 1994, but the above performance is from a David Gilmour solo concert at the Royal Albert Hall in 2006. Rick frequently toured with David and his band in his later years and thankfully there are some great audio and video recordings of many of those performances.

Including this one:

Clocking in at over 20 minutes, “Echoes” is one of Pink Floyd’s longest songs. The original studio version of it comprised the entire second side of their 1971 album “Meddle.”

“Echoes” may possibly be my favorite Pink Floyd song. It’s mostly instrumental, but the vocals that are there are amazing. I love the lyrics and David Gilmour and Richard Wright sound wonderful together singing them.

For me, this is the best live version I’ve ever seen heard or seen of “Echoes.” This performance was recorded on August 26th, 2006. It was later released on the “Live in Gdansk” album and DVD on September 22, 2008, which was exactly one week after Rick Wright died.

Just a couple of weeks after Rick passed, David Gilmour was a recipient at an awards ceremony. When he took the stage, he gave this short and very moving speech about his friend Richard Wright. He dedicates his award to Rick and asks the people there to join him in a toast to his departed friend.

David gets a little choked up at the end. I have to admit, I do too while watching this.

Cheers, Richard. Thank you for the wonderful music.

If you enjoyed the above, you may also enjoy this article I wrote about Pink Floyd’s Obscured By Clouds album. It’s a wonderful album which is often (sadly) overlooked by many fans of the band:

Thank you for reading! If you’d like to connect with me outside of Medium, you can also find me on X, Substack, YouTube, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, and Goodreads. I’m also the host of the GOTTA POP podcast. Links to all of those things can be found here.