The cult of Pink Floyd is seemingly bullet proof, losing none of its fervency over the course of five decades.
Nowhere was this more evident than at “The Pink Floyd Show, a World Tribute Concert,” last Saturday at Guadalajara’s beautifully appointed Teatro Diana.
Actually, a cursory scan of the crowded foyer bespoke a pronounced demographic imbalance in favor of persons born after 1970, with only a few boomer-age concert-goers flecking the relatively youthful crowd with touches of grey. However, more than a few teenagers were seen moping about the grounds clad in black Dark Side of the Moon t-shirts.
Those in attendance at Saturday’s celebration of all things Floyd were united, regardless of age, in their passion for the music, vigorously expressed vis-a-vis song requests screamed from the rafters down on the heads of the nine-strong ensemble below, who impeccably reproduced, right down to the most minute phrasal nuance, 16 songs taken from the group’s multi-decade-spanning career.
Puzzlingly, close to half of the repertoire was taken from their post-Roger Waters catalogue recorded in the 1980s and early 90s, which, for the majority of fans, represents the nadir of the band’s career.
Pink Floyd was formed in the fecund creative greenhouse that was the mid-60s London rock scene by Waters, singer Syd Barrett, keyboardist Richard Wright and drummer Nick Mason. In 1968, Gilmour was added on lead guitar and vocals, ostensibly to augment the band’s already baroque psychedelic sound. However, Barrett, while a brilliant songwriter and visionary, had for some time showed himself to be unpredictable and mentally unstable; Gilmour was hired, in effect, to be his replacement. For the next 15 years, he and Waters would form the core of Floyd’s leadership, an artistically fruitful but troubled nucleus whose cohesive integrity became more and more tenuous as time went on. In 1983, Waters left the band after years of crescendo-ing internal conflict. Without Waters, the band continued to tour sporadically and released three more albums before calling it quits for good in 2014.
The group assembled for Saturday’s tribute concert, lead by singer Gabriel Agudo, consisted of a drummer, bass player, keyboardist, three back-up singers and two guitarists 
trading off lead and rhythm duties. They did an excellent job, offering seamless but not embalmed recreations of many of the bands classics.
The production’s appropriately lysergic light show, designed by Jorge Espinoza, complemented nicely the music’s atmospheres and dynamics shifts.
However, the parade of images projected on a giant circular screen suspended above the musicians was slapdash; several montages were clearly taken from the Discovery Channel’s Planet Earth series - the program’s title was seen super-imposed several times over helicopter shots of canyons and soaring birds. And in a few instances, the projectionists opted to accompany songs with their corresponding MTV music videos, complete with opening and closing credits – a lazy, artless stratagem jarringly at odds with the rest of the production’s sparkling professionalism.
But judging by the roar that greeted the first notes of the show’s closing song, the anthemic and expansive “Comfortably Numb,” a little frayed visual stitching didn’t seem to bother the crowd in the least, especially when veteran guitarist Ruggiero Businari ripped out a faithful reproduction of Gilmour’s epic, wailing guitar solo. It was a fittingly nostalgia-drenched, cathartic way to end an evening dedicated to past glory, a vision and a sound whose echoes don’t show any sign of growing fainter.
More tributes to Brit legends
If you’re interested in musical tributes, especially ones for beloved artists who have passed away, two coming events will peak your interest.
Wednesday, August 30, at the Telmex Auditorium in Zapopan, Argentinian band God Save the Queen will present their fiery tribute to, you guessed it, Queen, whose golden-voiced front man, Freddy Mercury, died 26 years ago. The show is internationally-acclaimed, drawing praise from publications such as Rolling Stone Magazine.
Saturday, November 25, David Brighton’s Space Oddity comes to Teatro Diana in central Guadalajara. The show pays tribute to legendary, protean force of nature, David Bowie, who died early 2016. Brighton is considered one of the best – if not the best – Bowie imitator currently working.