Capacity: 19,000
Concert starts: 8pm

Address of venue: 1510 Polk Street, Houston, TX 77002. MAP

Website: www.houstontoyotacenter.com

COMMENTS

Roger's tour of The Wall arrives in Houston for the first of two shows in Texas. The venue is a new one to Roger, with him not having performed here before. The concert advert to the right (click thumbnail) comes courtesy of BD's own Elliot Tayman.

The RogerWaters.com presales began starting Wednesday, May 5th. Starting May 3rd, American Express Cardmembers could get advance tickets, with seating available to Gold Card, Platinum Card and Centurion members. US fans could also get early access to tickets via iTunes beginning Thursday, May 6th, by purchasing the 1982 film The Wall from iTunes by April 26th. For both the American Express and iTunes presales, please note that the presale offers were available in select markets and ticket quantities were limited.

General sale tickets went on sale on Monday, May 10, via Ticketmaster.com and LiveNation.com. The public sale also saw a limited number of VIP packages made available for each show on the tour. Use of our links to Ticketmaster gives much needed assistance with site hosting costs without any additional cost to yourself - and we appreciate it!

WARNING - SPOILERS AHEAD!

Do not read on if you don't want surprises to be spoilt, regarding what the band played, and what happened as the night unfolded!

Night thirty-nine of the tour, and a return for Roger to Texas, a state which will see two shows - here in Houston, and tomorrow night in Dallas. If you went to this show in Houston, please let us know what you thought of the event, and if anything interesting or different happened if you've been to previous shows and can compare.

Houston Calling has posted an illustrated review, which praised the show. 'From the onset, those in last night's capacity crowd at Houston's Toyota Center knew they were in for a show. It began with a "homeless" man shuffling his way through the aisles of the venue's floor and led into a parade of flag bearers in mock military garb before launching into the spectacularly pyrotechnics-enhanced intro of "In The Flesh" and "The Thin Ice". Once Waters hit the stage it was apparent this was his moment–his artistic statement–and no matter of legal wrangling and bad blood between his former Pink Floyd bandmates could keep him from his mission.'

They conclude by saying 'Roger Waters' experiences, insecurities, and talents helped him craft The Wall, and last night's performance reinforced why his music remains among the most notable in rock history. At the end of the show, Waters commented on the feelings of alienation that led him to pen The Wall and how close he felt to his fans after all this time. "I don't feel…alienated any longer," he said. It was good to see how time has healed Waters' wounds.'

CONCERT REVIEW and PICTURES by BD CONTRIBUTOR, John Fortier

What a show!!! I have seen Pink Floyd three times, and Gilmour & Waters' solo shows, and I have never seen anything like this.

The excitement by the crowd was palpable before the show started, and when it did start - wow! The fireworks, the bombast, and the airplane of 'In The Flesh' was a spectacle to behold; and that was only the first song.

The show got better as it went along. Highlights are too numerous to mention, but 'Bring the Boys Back Home' was very moving.

Starting with Comfortably Numb, the show wound toward the big finale and it was spectacular. This was truly a once in a lifetime event - thanks Roger!!

CONCERT REVIEW, PICTURES and VIDEO by BD CONTRIBUTOR, Simon Wimpenny

Kipp Lennon came past and I asked him if he wouldn't mind posing for a picture with myself and then with my friend Patrick. I hadn't met Kipp as yet but I'd met all the other backing singers while been backstage at one point or another along the tour. He was more than willing to pose and we had a good chat for 5 or 10 minutes.

I was saying how cool it is that there are new things been added each night and he proceeded to tell us how Roger takes a DVD of the show back to the hotel with him each night, sits and watches it, takes notes then destroys the DVD and then implements changes at the following show!! He does this every night without fail! If you read the link below it tells you how they implement the changes in the projections and how these are rendered at the production studios and then sent out for the show the next day!

Projection details

It was great to meet up with Patrick again, we exchanged cell numbers and said we would meet up in Dallas as well as maybe LA for the two shows that he is seeing.

Patrick was front row of the second section back, an ideal place to see his first show and I was 13th row right on the aisle between the centre and left section (I swear one night I'm gonna turn up to this seat and it'll have my name on the back like a directors chair,lol). Kipp had mentioned that Roger had again made some changes to tonight's show and I was eager to see what had changed. I totally missed the plane crashing and all the pyros at the end due to focusing on the projections and lighting.

I didn't notice much for the first few tracks however I did notice some projections changes at the beginning of Young Lust and also some lighting changes during young Lust and Empty Spaces, kinda hard to explain them but they were there and they were apparent and did look better than at previous shows.

There was yet another glitch in Dave's guitar at the beginning of Young Lust, not as bad as last night where it cut out completely for 5 seconds but it was a glitch and it was clearly audible.

The band seemed real tight tonight, all the endings of the songs were flawless each member of the band played the last note dead on time, I know when I spoke to Dave a few shows back we were talking about the click track and how sometimes it's actually difficult to go by as some of the band play slightly slower (Snowy) and some of the band tend to be slightly ahead (Dave and Jon) I guess tonight they were all dead on and this certainly showed.

At intermission I went back and saw Patrick for 5 minutes and then took my seat again and read some of the Fallen Loved ones on the wall. The intermission seems to go a lot quicker after they cut it down to 20 minutes and it always amazes me that even though they have an announcement over the PA telling everyone there's five minutes to go there hundreds of people still walking around at the beginning of Hey You!

One thing I haven't mentioned yet is the crowd, they were bad, I mean REAL bad, they sat down the whole time, there was no real interaction or any real cheering just a few appreciative claps and that was it! Obviously they stayed seated for Hey You, if an audience that stands the whole show stay seated for this then Houston was certainly gonna do that!

Hey You, ITAOT, Nobody Home, Vera all went by rather quick, didn't spot any changes at all in these tracks. I love the bit at the end of Nobody Home from The Wall soundtrack where the fighter pilot guy shouts "where the hell are you Simon?" Always makes me smile.

Roger now has a metal tube that holds his machine gun by his side during the second half! He still looks down at Robbie to pass it up to him but as also now added flashes of light on the wall behind as he fires the gun off, this looks great and again shows how things are changing each night.

Run Like Hell was fantastic and once again the new graphic was used and I managed to capture it on video tonight. Roger again took his Machine gun and shot down the graphic.

The wall came down OK tonight, nothing really special but the one thing it did do was get the crowd on their feet!! There were a few people on their feet for Run Like Hell and Waiting For The Worms but nowhere near as many as there is at most of the shows.

All in all a great gig with the exception of the crowd being pretty laid back.

Make sure you check out Simon's blog at SimonWimpenny.blogspot.com where you'll find full details of all his travels, along with more pictures and videos.

CONCERT REVIEWS and PICTURES by other BD CONTRIBUTORS

Hopefully coming soon - we welcome all contributions!

YOUR HELP NEEDED! We want to cover Roger's concerts the best we can, to share the experience with everyone, especially those who won't be able to attend the shows. We'd love to see ANY pictures, tickets scans, reviews, newspaper reports, and anything else you come across for this show - we look forward to hearing from you!