The Wall Rehearsal

Shot on a tripod from the left balcony, Mal was able to capture a good part of Pink Floyd rehearsing The Wall at Earl's Court. The tape has faired well over the years and I was able to pull off a pretty decent transfer from this VHS relic. I tweaked the image a bit adding a tad of contrast and brightness to deepen the blacks without losing any of the details.

Please note that during "Goodbye Blue Sky" the camera zooms in to focus on the images on the screen. The camera remains here until the start of "One of My Turns" so unfortunately "Empty Spaces" and "Young Lust" do not show any images of the stage or musicians. In fact, the latter only features the lights on Mr Screen and I'm assuming that the camera was left shooting on the tripod without being checked until a few sonngs later. Anyone who doesn't want to sit through this can simply advance to the next track.

This DVD contains the full contents of the master VHS tape. The only time I added short dissolves was to cut out the points where the camera was paused and then started again, causing severe tape glitches and audio distortion.

(excerpt from Mal's original post on YouTube)
"I was fortunate enough to have a tenancy at Earls Court which expired at Midnight. I was asked if the band could rehearse, given the hall was contractually still mine. I had no objection. I rushed home, picked up my "steam powered VHS" and filmed what I could. It's been hidden away for 27 years, I recently got the tape out, had a quick edit and posted."

A big thanks to Mal for digging this up, trusting me with his master, and for sharing it with us all!

Enjoy!
RonToon
(April 2008)

Added: 28.01.2009