Why the 1970 BBC 'Fat Old Sun' Is David Gilmour’s Holy Grail Guitar Moment

Most bootlegs of Floyd’s 1970 BBC session circulate as muffled audience tapes, but the professionally recorded “Fat Old Sun” from that broadcast is the rare document where you can hear Gilmour’s Stratocaster breathe. The album version on Atom Heart Mother is a pastoral, folk-tinged track with a short, tidy solo that fades out under two minutes. The BBC version turns that same solo into a nine-minute exploratory odyssey, with Gilmour locking into a long, patient build that prefigures his later work on “Echoes” and “Shine On You Crazy Diamond.”

What makes it a holy grail is the tone: plugged straight into a WEM amp with only a fuzz box and a Binson Echorec, Gilmour’s sustain feels almost vocal. The BBC recording captures the amp’s natural overdrive without studio gloss, and he stretches phrases into melodic arcs that never appeared on any official release. The extended middle section also includes a rare, almost jazzy chord sequence that he abandoned entirely after this performance.

The differences aren’t just length. The album version has a double-tracked vocal and a relaxed, country-ish feel; the BBC take is live in one pass, with Gilmour singing while playing a wiry, electric rhythm part that doesn’t exist on the LP. For fans obsessed with his early approach — before the pedalboard grew to stadium size — this tape is the purest snapshot of a guitarist finding his voice in real time.