Pink Floyd's 'Wish You Were Here' Expanded For 50th Anniversary Box Set
(SFM) Half a century to the day since its original 1975 release, Pink Floyd have announced the 50th anniversary edition of their era-defining album Wish You Were Here.
Out December 12th via Sony Music, Wish You Were Here 50 gives fans an exciting new perspective into one of Pink Floyd's most iconic and best-loved records. The 50th anniversary edition features multiple discs of rarities - at the core of this special collection are six previously unreleased alternate versions and demos presenting Pink Floyd's eighth studio album in a brand new way that demands repeat listening.
Wish You Were Here 50 will be released in multiple formats including 3LP, 2CD, Blu-ray, digital and a Deluxe Box Set. The digital release includes the original 1975 album, featuring a new Dolby Atmos mix by James Guthrie, whose work with Pink Floyd dates back to 1979's The Wall. It also includes 25 bonus tracks made up of nine studio rarities, and 16 live recordings captured by the renowned bootlegger Mike Millard at Pink Floyd's Los Angeles Sports Arena concert on April 26th 1975, now receiving its first official release. The live audio has been meticulously restored and remastered by Steven Wilson. The Blu-ray edition also gives fans the chance to see three concert screen films from the band's 1975 tour, plus a Storm Thorgerson short film. The 3LP and 2CD formats include the original album and the nine studio bonus tracks. The Deluxe Box Set includes all 2CD, 3LP (on exclusive clear vinyl) and Blu-Ray material, plus a fourth clear vinyl LP, Live At Wembley 1974, a replica Japanese 7" Single of Have A Cigar b/w Welcome To The Machine, a hardcover book including unseen photographs, a comic book tour programme and Knebworth concert poster. Exclusive 50th Anniversary Merchandise along with Limited Edition product releases will also be available at PinkFloyd.com.
To celebrate the album announcement, a previously unheard early demo recording of "Welcome to the Machine" originally titled "The Machine Song" is released today. Shorter in length than the epic original, "The Machine Song (Demo #2, Revisited)" gives fans an exciting preview of what to expect from Wish You Were Here 50. Other studio rarities to be released include "The Machine Song (Roger's demo)," the first home demo of the song that Roger Waters originally brought to the band, a previously unheard instrumental mix of the track "Wish You Were Here" showcasing David Gilmour's pedal steel guitar, and for the first time, a complete "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Pts. 1-9)" that joins together the two halves of the song, newly mixed in stereo by James Guthrie.
Wish You Were Here has been a mainstay on all-time greatest albums lists for decades. The multi-Platinum-selling #1 hit record was Pink Floyd's first to reach the top of the charts on both sides of the Atlantic, becoming the band's fastest selling album. In 1973, The Dark Side of the Moon had taken Pink Floyd from a hugely successful breakout British band to one of the biggest rock groups on the planet. Wish You Were Here was the band's powerful response to their newfound global fame.
Featuring the multi-part eulogy to Syd Barrett "Shine On You Crazy Diamond," the hypnotic "Welcome To The Machine," the scathing "Have a Cigar," with its immortal line "Oh by the way, which one's Pink?" famously sung not by Waters or Gilmour, but by non band-member Roy Harper, and the essential title track, Wish You Were Here is undoubtedly one of the most important album releases in the history of popular music.
The record's themes of absence, isolation, transience, and comment on the insincerity of the music business are embodied in the iconic album artwork. The visual puns developed by Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey 'Po' Powell at Hipgnosis remain instantly recognisable visual statements today.
Remembering that time, Aubrey 'Po' Powell said: "In the 1970s, album covers were equally as important as the music, because the cover helped to sell the record. Record stores would carry 10,000 different images in album sleeves, so what we were doing had to look different and stand out amongst the crowd.
I remember turning around to Storm and saying, how are we going to set a man on fire? Because there was no digital way of doing it in those days. He said, Po, you're just going to have to do it for real. That was it.
One has to remember that Pink Floyd were the only band on EMI and Capitol Records who had the rights to the creative - in terms of album cover - besides the Beatles. That's why we were allowed to do what we wanted. It was brilliant. Just the same way that Pink Floyd were a very inventive band at the time, so were Hipgnosis. We were determined to keep that abstract, enigmatic image alive and hence, we were able to do that for Pink Floyd."
In 2025 the ardent support and fascination surrounding Pink Floyd's music remains. The newly restored version of their groundbreaking 1972 film Pink Floyd at Pompeii - MCMLXXII stormed box offices around the world, with the live album debuting at #1 on the UK Albums Chart, marking the band's first UK chart-topper in eleven years and the seventh in their career. The film was praised by critics and audiences the world over, with The Guardian describing it as a "mesmerically peculiar portrait of a band on cusp of greatness."
50 years since its release, Wish You Were Here sounds as resonant and vital as ever, and in reaching this milestone deserves to be celebrated anew. This special anniversary edition allows fans, for the first time, to delve deeper into a pivotal moment in Pink Floyd's history.
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