What Caused the Roger Waters and David Gilmour Feud?

The feud exploded in 1985 when Roger Waters declared Pink Floyd a “spent force” and sued to prevent David Gilmour and Nick Mason from using the band name. That legal battle – Waters wanted to dissolve the entity; Gilmour and Mason wanted to continue – became the permanent scar. It wasn’t just about the name, it was about who got to decide what Pink Floyd meant.

But the roots go deeper. During the making of The Final Cut (1983), Waters effectively excluded Gilmour from writing, reducing him to a session guitarist. Gilmour had little creative input, and the tension in the studio was palpable. After that album, both men simply couldn’t share the room anymore. They haven’t performed together since a one-off 2005 Live 8 reunion, and even that brief truce quickly soured into fresh public sniping over money, politics, and the legacy of the band.