Openers: The 60 Essential Pink Floyd Unauthorized Live Recordings - Paperback

by Scott Meze (Author)

UPDATED VERSION MARCH 2026

In this sumptuous, large-format book, Scott Meze details the Waters era Pink Floyd only its most devoted fans know, one that rests not just on remarkable studio albums but on the vital and priceless treasure box of live recordings taped surreptitiously by members of the audience. He describes the 60 best-sounding and most revelatory of these recordings, opening a whole new way to think about and experience the band.

THE EXPERT INTRODUCTION TO PINK FLOYD'S HIDDEN LIVE LEGACY

Between its inception and Roger Waters's departure in 1985, Pink Floyd played about 900 concerts in almost 300 towns and cities in 15 different countries.

Many of these performances are lost to time, but the collector has a remarkable archive to draw upon. Almost a third of all Pink Floyd concerts from the Waters era were secretly recorded and circulate among fans. The band itself has made many of them available for streaming, even if only briefly and for reasons purely of copyright extension.

In his series documenting the band's psychedelic odyssey in depth, Temples Of Light, Stone On Stone, Riding The Tide, and Cold Thrills, Scott Meze explored these tapes in unprecedented detail, documenting every known live recording from 1967 to 1981 in terms of the songs and improvisations played, the importance of the music to the band's development, and its quality and effect on the listener.

But where do you start? In Openers, Meze expands on that work to highlight the greatest unauthorized live recordings from the Waters era, building an essential shadow history of Pink Floyd as it progressed from A Saucerful Of Secrets psychedelia to the spectacles of The Dark Side Of The Moon and The Wall.

Here are 60 great-sounding, immersive live experiences from across the band's formative and glory years. Meze introduces the tapes you must hear now, and shows why they should survive more than just a limited-period copyright dump.