Roger Waters - Amused To Death (1992)

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.

The third song, Perfect Sense (Part I), begins with a loud, unintelligible rant, and after that one can hear backwards-uttered words scattered about for the first two minutes of the song. Played on reverse, this message tells that Roger has decided to record a backwards message. "Julia, however, in the light and visions of the issues of Stanley,we changed our minds. We have decided to include a backward message.Stanley,for you,and for all the other book partner's". The message climaxes with the loud screaming, which interestingly enough makes no more sense in reverse (although it can be said that it sounds angry in the way of cartoon swearing). Waters stated in an interview with Rockline on 8 February 1993 that he wanted to use samples of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey on the album. Stanley Kubrick, the director, turned him down on the basis that it would open the door to many other people using the sound sample. He has since then used audio of HAL describing his mind being taken away when performing the song live (as an intro, specifically during his In the Flesh concert tours, after Kubrick's death).
Also in Perfect Sense, Pt.2, Marv Albert gives a mock commentary on the destruction of an oil rig with torpedoes fired by a submarine.
Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea recorded a part for the album (specifically for a different, more uptempo version of It's a Miracle), but this was not used.
Waters wrote portions of the lyrics by verbally improvising over the music.
In The Bravery of Being Out of Range, Waters sings, "I looked over Jordan and what did I see. Saw a U.S. Marine in a pile of debris" – which echoes his similar line in Sheep (from Pink Floyd's Animals (1977): "I've looked over Jordan, and I have seen things are not what they seem."

Personnel
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
Randy Jackson - 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

Songs:

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

Link:

rapidshare.com/files/61619163/rw-amtode.part1.rar.html

rapidshare.com/files/61630164/rw-amtode.part2.rar.html