Another Brick In The Wall (Part 1)

Hey Zoo Freaks, the Zoo Crew just dropped the needle on something a little different from the usual freeform rock playlist. Steve Morse, the guitar wizard who spent nearly three decades holding down the six-string slot in Deep Purple, is taking on Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick In The Wall (Part 1)” from the 2007 compilation Pink Box: Songs Of Pink Floyd. This is no straight cover. Morse lays down lead guitar over a version that first appeared on the 2005 all-star tribute Back Against the Wall, produced by Billy Sherwood and Bob Kulick. The track sits right in the middle of a massive gathering of prog and rock players that includes members of Yes, The Doors, Jethro Tull, Toto, King Crimson and plenty more. Morse’s contribution is pure technical fire wrapped in that unmistakable melodic sensibility that has defined his playing since the Dixie Dregs days. The original Part 1, written by Roger Waters for The Wall, digs into the moment when young Pink’s father is gone forever after flying across the ocean and leaving behind nothing but a snapshot in the family album. Waters has talked in interviews about how the whole Wall concept grew out of the alienation he felt on big stadium tours, the wall between band and audience turning into a metaphor for every brick of isolation in a person’s life. Morse’s take keeps the emotional weight while letting his fingers explore the spaces Gilmour left open, trading some of the original’s stark atmosphere for the kind of precise, interlocking lines that made the Dregs stand out in the fusion world.

What makes this version stick with listeners is how it fits into a larger project that was basically a progressive rock reunion by another name. Back Against the Wall gathered Chris Squire, Rick Wakeman, Steve Howe, Alan White, Robby Krieger, Ian Anderson, John Wetton, Adrian Belew, Tony Levin and a whole list of other names who had shaped the sound of the seventies and eighties. Sherwood handled a lot of the vocals, bass and keyboards on Morse’s track, keeping the arrangement tight while giving the guitar room to breathe. The sessions went down at 4Tune Studios in Van Nuys, California, the same kind of Southern California facility that has hosted countless rock projects over the years. Morse has always been the kind of player who can walk into a room full of heavyweights and still sound like himself. Years later he would work with Bob Ezrin, the producer who helped shape The Wall itself, when Ezrin produced Deep Purple albums. In interviews Morse has spoken about the challenge of satisfying a producer used to Gilmour’s ultra-melodic style while still slipping in the technical runs that are second nature to him. That same balance shows up on this Brick in the Wall cut. It never tries to out-Floyd Floyd. It simply lets Morse’s signature tone, built on his Music Man guitar and DiMarzio pickups, find new corners inside Waters’ melody about absence and the first bricks of a lifetime wall.

Zoo Freaks who dig into the original album know that Part 1 is the quietest of the three Brick songs, more about the empty space left by a missing father than the schoolyard rebellion of Part 2 or the full isolation of Part 3. The lyric “Daddy’s flown across the ocean, leaving just a memory, a snapshot in the family album” has always hit hard for anyone who grew up with a parent who never came home from war or from work or from whatever took them away. Morse’s instrumental-leaning approach, with Sherwood carrying the vocal, keeps that ache while adding the kind of harmonic movement that comes from years of writing fusion charts. The compilation Pink Box gathered this track alongside other Floyd interpretations by everyone from Alien Sex Fiend to Nik Turner, turning the whole set into a wide-open exploration of the Floyd catalog. Morse’s piece stands out because it sounds like a musician who has spent a lifetime studying both the technical side of the guitar and the emotional side of a well-written melody. It is the same approach he has described in countless interviews: he never wanted to be the center of the stage in the conventional rock-star sense. He wanted to compose and play music that mixed styles that were not always fashionable.

That independent streak showed up early. Steve Morse was born in Hamilton, Ohio, in 1954. The family moved around, first to Tennessee and Michigan, then settled in Augusta, Georgia, when he was a teenager. He started on piano and clarinet because that was what was around, but the guitar took over once he heard the Beatles and watched a guy at a local carnival play fingerstyle acoustic while running a ride. In one interview Morse recalled renting a cheap Gibson acoustic for five dollars a month and struggling to make it sound like the records he loved. He took classical lessons from Juan Mercadal, who later taught at the University of Miami. Morse has said he knew as a kid that the music he wanted to write would probably never be the most popular thing on the radio, and he was fine with that. He just wanted to keep playing. At the Academy of Richmond County he met bassist Andy West. They formed early bands that mixed rock covers with original ideas. Morse was even expelled from high school for refusing to cut his hair, which turned out to be a lucky break because it let him finish his last year at a Catholic school and head early to the University of Miami School of Music. There he studied alongside future stars like Pat Metheny and Jaco Pastorius. A campus show by John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra sealed the deal. Morse decided instrumental rock and fusion were the path. He and West built the Dixie Dregs out of leftover pieces from an earlier group called the Dixie Grit. The name stuck because, as Morse has joked, the Dregs were all that was left.

The Dregs signed with Capricorn Records and released Free Fall in 1977. Morse wrote every track on that debut, blending rock, jazz, classical and country influences into something that did not sound like anyone else. The band earned Grammy nominations and a devoted following among guitar players who appreciated the technical command without the empty flash. After the Dregs Morse spent a few years with Kansas, appearing on Power and In the Spirit of Things. Then in 1994 he stepped into Deep Purple after Ritchie Blackmore left. He stayed for twenty-eight years, the longest any guitarist has held the job, recording albums from Purpendicular through Turning to Crime and playing hundreds of shows while still finding time for the Steve Morse Band and side projects like Flying Colors. He has talked about the first Purple shows being a trial run of only four dates so both sides could decide if it felt right. It did. Along the way he became a licensed pilot, something he has called his greatest passion outside music, and he still works a hay farm when the schedule allows. Health issues, including arthritis in his hands and the loss of his wife Janine, led him to step away from Purple in 2022, but he has kept writing and recording. The recent Steve Morse Band album Triangulation features guest spots from John Petrucci and Eric Johnson, two players he has known for decades. Morse has described the title as a navigational term, finding your position from known points, and also as a nod to the three-piece band relying on each other like the legs of a stool.

Fans who want to follow the full story can check the official site at Steve Morse Official Website, where news about tours, transcriptions and new releases shows up regularly. The verified Facebook page is at Steve Morse on Facebook, and the Instagram account run with his involvement is theofficialstevemorse. There is also an X account at Steve Morse on X that has carried the occasional update over the years. For deeper discography details, gear notes and news compiled by dedicated fans, the site stevemorse.net gathers a lot of information in one place, and the long-running Facebook group at Steve Morse Fan Page keeps the conversation going with thousands of members swapping stories and rare clips. All of it points back to a player who started with a rented acoustic and a clear sense that the road he wanted would be the less traveled one. The Zoo Crew keeps spinning records like this one because they remind everybody that the best rock and roll still comes from musicians who treat the guitar like a tool for composition instead of just volume. Keep listening, Zoo Freaks, and stay tuned to THE ZOO for more deep cuts from the freeform side of the dial.