Video Classics: ‘Learning to Fly’ – Pink Floyd

David Gilmour in 2009 (Danny Martindale, Getty Images)

For many years, Roger Waters was the driving creative force behind Pink Floyd, sending them down a highly-innovative and experimental road that ultimately led to such groundbreaking and popular works as The Wall. As the band entered the mid-’80s, however, their complexion began to change. Waters began having more and more frequent arguments with bandmate David Gilmour. Waters wanted to continue to press for Pink Floyd’s music to push the envelope regarding social commentary. Gilmour, on the other hand, wanted to focus on getting back to making quality rock music, and accused Waters of simply stringing bits of song together as a framework for his socially-critical lyrics. Things got so bad that the former friends couldn’t even be in the studio at the same time, and ultimately Waters left the band in 1985.

The band decided to continue on, though it took them a while to fully reconstitute themselves. It was during this period that their album A Momentary Lapse of Reason was released. Gilmour’s influence was heard immediately (with some critics contending that since bandmates Nick Mason and Richard Wright had contributed so little, respectively, the album should have been considered a Gilmour solo effort). Many critics panned the work, but even Waters had to admit that it was not without its brighter spots.

One of these was the song “Learning to Fly”. Many critics and fans consider it the best of the post-Waters Pink Floyd songs. While it deals with the subject of flying, for which Gilmour has an intense interest (he and Mason both conquered their fear of flying to go on to become private pilots), it also speaks metaphorically to his thoughts on learning to take over the reins of Pink Floyd.  The video, which features images of eagles, hang gliding, and a young man taking a leap of faith to learn to fly, himself, also echoes these themes.

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