Interviews

Roy Harper talks to Britsound, March 2009

Roy Harper

Roy Harper angry with Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, says he’s a “bully” and Pink Floyd “had no idea what they were doing” until he helped them

Hear the relevant excerpt from the interview (full interview below)

Legendary English folk singer/songwriter Roy Harper has revealed that he is “very angry” that Pink Floyd has yet to pay him for singing lead vocals on Have a Cigar on their 1975 Wish You Were Here album and has called Roger Waters a “bully” who “is against paying anybody for doing anything in his past.”

In an interview this week (March 25) on the nationally syndicated Britsound Radio Show, Harper said that the issue of his non-payment is an injustice that now needs to be resolved.

Roy Harper told Britsound’s Gillian Lomax that Pink Floyd has “kept it hidden from themselves for 34 years. I still haven’t been paid. It wasn’t money that I wanted, but I made an agreement with them for a lifetime season ticket to Lord’s”, said Harper. Instead Harper says that the Pink Floyd manager sent him a check for 200 pounds (GBP) but he tore it up in disgust.

Harper says Roger Waters is the reason why he hasn’t been paid: “Roger isn’t going to move a muscle. Roger is against paying anybody anything for doing anything in his past… Roger’s determined to be a bully and that’s it. There’s no one on this earth who can stop him from being a bully because he’s got the cash to be a bully.”

Of the song Have a Cigar, Harper explained to Gillian Lomax that the reason why he sung vocals was because “they could not sing it to save their lives. They couldn’t sing it for toffee. Roger had pitched it too high. So I said I’d do it for a price.”

Harper also described the disarray and lack of confidence that Pink Floyd had at that time: “They had this giant hit record with Dark Side of the Moon and they were all fishing about and didn’t know what they were going to do. They had no idea what they were doing.” Harper says that his contribution on Have a Cigar was a huge help to them: “Between Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall, there was nothing, except that single by me, which actually would have been ditched if I hadn’t sung it. My name wasn’t on the record for the first million copies.”

Harper, who is still friends with David Gilmour, now hopes that this situation can be resolved: “It’s a truly ridiculous situation. They should own up to it. They have to own up to it. This is the first time I’ve said this in an interview ever, but this has now gone past a joke. It makes me angry. This is an injustice.”

Britsound Radio Show Host Rob Quicke said “because of the strong interest in this interview we’ve decided to put the whole interview up online at Britsound.com.” The Britsound Radio Show is based in Wayne, NJ and is heard on over 20 stations in America and the world. It was founded in 2005 by its host Rob Quicke and it plays new and classic British music to its American audience. Its purpose is to “fuel the new British invasion.

Full interview:

Part One

Part Two

Links:

http://www.royharper.com