How Anthony Moore Helped Richard Wright Turn Depression Into a Concept Album on 'Broken China'

Richard Wright’s second solo album, Broken China, wasn’t just a collection of songs — it was a deliberate, almost therapeutic exercise. After Pink Floyd’s The Division Bell sessions, where Wright reconnected with the band, he fell into a deep depression following the breakdown of his third marriage. Rather than bury it, he decided to write an album about it, framing the narrative as a fictional woman’s journey through psychological collapse. To give the lyrics the precision and weight the subject deserved, he brought in Anthony Moore.

Moore was a natural fit. He had co-written lyrics on The Division Bell (Wearing the Inside Out, Lost for Words) and understood Wright’s introspective, non-verbal approach to music. Moore took Wright’s fragments — words, phrases, emotional cues — and shaped them into a coherent story arc. Their process was intimate and iterative: Wright would play a chord sequence or a keyboard line, Moore would respond with a lyrical idea, and they’d map the emotional terrain together.

The lyrics are unflinchingly direct. On the title track, Wright sings