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Roger speaks on the Elliott Smith memorial

Posted by madhack on May 5, 2010

Well, the new tour and the marketing campaign around it are sure producing more Floyd news than usual...

Several blogs and small papers in Los Angeles (such as LA Weekly) have noted, with a degree of outrage that may be somewhat confusing to anyone who's never heard of Mr. Smith, that Roger's "street team" "defaced" a memorial to the late musician.

As the facts have emerged, a few things have become clear: the promoters almost certainly chose the location on their own with no direction from Waters (despite LA Weekly's suggestion that the evil "dinosaur" has paid people to disrespect a local legend), and the anti-war quote covering the ad hoc memorial (which has itself been modified by "street artists" many times in the past) consists of an easily-removed wheat paste.

In the wake of the regional backlash, Roger has apologized (and made clear that the image will be removed) in a statement on the tour's official Facebook page, as well as in an interview with the Los Angeles Times Music Blog. In the interview, he goes on to note that he feels Elliott Smith would have appreciated the sentimentperhaps not likely to soothe Smith's fans, but also perhaps true.

Whatever the case may be, it's clear that Roger meant no disrespect to a beloved artist.


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