Tag: photo

Our thanks to BD regular Ian McKenzie who shares his recollections of Battersea Power Station in London, from 1977, when Animals was released, in 1981, en route to seeing Pink Floyd at Earls Court for The Wall, and then – bringing the story up to date – a very recent visit as part of his birthday celebrations! Ian talks about the refurbished building, including the lift which takes you to the top of one of the rebuilt chimneys, giving you an Algie-eye’s view of the surroundings. Needless to say, some of his images and descriptions might be considered spoilers if you are considering a visit – or indeed, if you’ve been a bit unsure, he might have convinced you it is worth a visit. For more information on visiting the site, and what’s there, check out BatterseaPowerStation.co.uk (https://batterseapowerstation.co.uk). Now, over to Ian: Having discovered Pink Floyd in 1976, I can remember the release of the Animals album in early 1977. However, as I was in my early teens and surviving on pocket money, I was unable to afford to buy the album until I was on holiday in July of the same year. Even though I was unable to play the album until I returned home from the holiday, I was completely intrigued by the building on the album cover. I was convinced that this building didn’t actually exist and that the cover was just an elaborate illustration. However, the black and white photos inside the album sleeve certainly looked real enough and at some point over the coming weeks I learned that the building in question was Battersea Power Station in London. Regardless of Animals being one of my favourite Pink Floyd albums, I have also found the building itself to be particularly fascinating. Fast forward to 1981 and I was in London to see one of the Pink Floyd The Wall shows at Earls Court. I’d also been lucky enough to have seen this show at the same venue the year before, and I decided on my return to try to get a glimpse of Battersea Power Station before heading to the concert in my Pink Floyd tee-shirt and velvet jacket (the height of fashion in 1981, honest). I’d worked out from a map that probably the easiest means of seeing the power station would be from Chelsea Bridge, so I headed south from Sloane Square tube station along Chelsea Bridge Road. I managed to spot the power station before reaching the bridge and I was very impressed to see it in all its glory from the bridge itself. It was a lovely sunny day with a fairly clear blue sky, so I managed to capture a photo or two with my recently acquired Rollei 35mm compact camera [see picture below]. This was the same camera that I used later that evening to capture some photos of the concert itself. These pics can be seen elsewhere on the Brain Damage website – follow this link to see them (https://www.brain-damage.co.uk/the-wall/the-wall-live-1981-earls-court-pictures.html).