Artist: ROGER WATERS
Album: AMUSED TO DEATH (CD)

Year: 1992
Media type: CD

Featuring Jeff Beck on guitar, Amused to Death further explores Waters' disillusionment with modern Western society, focusing specifically on the influence of television and the mass media. The album was inspired by the book Amusing Ourselves to Death, a critique of television and its related culture by Neil Postman.

In typical Waters fashion, Amused to Death is a concept album— this one organized loosely around the idea of a monkey randomly switching channels on a television— but explores numerous political and social themes, including a critique of the First Gulf War, in which Waters has a loud choir sing his "global anthem" : "Can't you see? It all makes perfect sense. Expressed in dollars and cents, pounds, shillings, and pence." The song "Watching TV" explores the influence of mass media on the Chinese protests for democracy in Tiananmen Square.

The album is mixed in QSound to enhance the spatial feel of the audio, and the many Waters-style sound effects on the album - rifle range ambience, sleighbells, cars, planes, distant horses and dogs all make use of the 3-D facility. This album's stellar audio quality also caught the attention of renowned audio mastering guru Bob Katz, who placed Amused to Death on his Honor Roll List of Good-Sounding Pop CDs (as seen at digido.com). A limited "MasterSound" edition was also made.

Amused to Death reached #21 on The Billboard 200, aided by "What God Wants, Part I", which hit #4 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks in 1992.

There was no tour in support of this record, although Roger has performed several songs from it on his recent In the Flesh and Dark Side of the Moon tours.

TRACKLIST:

01 "The Ballad of Bill Hubbard" – 4:19
02 "What God Wants, Part I" – 6:00
03 "Perfect Sense, Part I" – 4:16
04 "Perfect Sense, Part II" – 2:50
05 "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" – 4:43
06 "Late Home Tonight, Part I" – 4:00
07 "Late Home Tonight, Part II" – 2:13
08 "Too Much Rope" – 5:47
09 "What God Wants, Part II" – 3:41
10 "What God Wants, Part III" – 4:08
11 "Watching TV" – 6:07
12 "Three Wishes" – 6:50
13 "It's a Miracle" – 8:30
14 "Amused to Death" – 9:06

All songs written by Roger Waters.

LINE-UP:

Roger Waters - synthesizer, bass, guitars, vocals
Jeff Beck - guitar on tracks 1, 2, 11, 12, 13, and solos on tracks 10 and 14
Rita Coolidge - vocals
Don Henley - vocals on track 11
Michael Kamen - arranger, conductor
John Patitucci - bass and electric guitars
Andy Fairweather-Low - acoustic, rhythm and electric guitars, vocals
Geoff Whitehorn - guitar
National Philharmonic Orchestra
Marv Albert - voices
Charles Fleischer - voices
P.P. Arnold - vocals
Graham Broad - percussion & drums
Luis Conte - percussion
John "Rabbit" Bundrick - organ
Denny Fongheiser - drums
Jeff Porcaro - Drums
B.J. Cole - steel guitar
Bruce Gaitsch - guitars
Rick DiFonzo - guitar
James Johnson - bass
Kenneth Bowen - conductor
John Dupree - arranger, conductor, string arrangements
Doreen Chanter - vocals
Linsey Fiddmont - vocals
N'Dea Davenport - vocals
Natalie Jackson - vocals
Steve Lukather - electric guitar
Jon Joyce - vocals
Katie Kissoon - vocals
Lynn Fiddmont - background vocals
Jim Haas - background vocals
Private William "Bill" Hubbard (1888-1917) - Eighth Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, City of London Regiment; dedicatee
Alfred Razzel - voice; Royal Fusiliers