Back in August, Pink Floyd The Later Years 1987-2019 was confirmed and detailed. It will appear as an 18-disc (if you include the two singles) box set, a double vinyl LP with selected highlights from the set, and a CD release of these highlights too.

This afternoon there has been a release update from the band - due to "production and logistical delays" the box set (and digital version) will now be released on Friday, December 13th, this year. The highlights 2LP/1CD (and again, digital version of this) isn't delayed, and will be released on Friday, November 29th, as previously announced. Click here for the track listing of the box set.

For those who need reminding, let's take a look at what is on offer. Looking at the largest item first, the box set, this consists of 5 CDs in a 60-page hardback book, 6 Blu-rays and 5 DVDs, each in gatefold wallets, 2 7" vinyl singles with material never released, a 40-page hardback photo book, replica tour programmes, and a reproduction memorabilia collection. The box set offers over six hours of previously unheard audio and over seven hours of previously unseen audiovisuals from A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, The Division Bell and The Endless River albums.

The CDs take in the 2019 remix of A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, a 2019 remix of Delicate Sound Of Thunder, a disc of live B-sides and unreleased material from The Division Bell, and a new remix of the 1990 Knebworth concert. With AMLOR, the album is presented for the first time in 5.1, and has been updated and remixed by David Gilmour and Andy Jackson. The release of The Later Years project gives an opportunity for a fresh overview of this album. By returning to some of Richard Wright's keyboard parts and recording new drum tracks with Nick Mason, producers David Gilmour and Bob Ezrin have restored the creative balance between the three Pink Floyd members.

The Blu-rays include 5.1 surround sound mixes of the above, as well as The Division Bell, a restored and remixed Delicate Sound of Thunder and includes additional tracks not on the original release, a re-edited PULSE, the full Venice 1989 and Knebworth 1990 concert films (Knebworth includes Great Gig In The Sky), along with music videos, the full range of tour screen films (including the very amusing Money screen film from 1994 with a very retro looking alien complete with ray gun), documentaries, and a new film by Ian Emes for The Endless River album. The DVDs replicate the above material with the exception of the surround sound mixes, which are only on the Blu-rays.

The two 7" vinyl singles host two previously unreleased songs - Arnold Layne from the 2007 Syd Barrett tribute concert at the Barbican, and Lost For Words recorded at the rehearsals for the 1994 Earls Court shows.

The double vinyl LP and CD "highlights" packages bring together a flavour of the full set, taking in tracks from Knebworth, The Division Bell sessions, the Momentary Lapse remix, Delicate Sound and more. This has different artwork to the box set.

For another sneak preview (previously, we shared on this site Wish You Were Here from the Knebworth 1990 concert, and the early version of High Hopes), here's another song from The Later Years that is now available to hear - the 2019 remix of One Slip, which BD's Ed Lopez-Reyes has talked about on our site in a separate review:

ORDERING INFORMATION:
You can order the various editions through the following direct links, taking advantage of Amazon's pre-order price guarantee so you will automatically pay the lowest asking price between placing your order, and release, whilst giving Brain Damage much needed help with running costs without costing you any extra. We really appreciate it too! All the below should be live when you read this, or if not, shortly.

Gerald Scarfe, the legendary cartoonist and designer, tells his life story for the first time in the excellent, newly published book, Long Drawn Out Trip.

In 1964 a young artist sat in the public gallery of the House of Commons, sketching former Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The Sunday Times refused to print the resulting drawing of this frail, aged figure - so far from the public image of the man - it was too truthful.

In the sixty years since, Gerald Scarfe's work has continued to expose the truth, and has appeared many times in the pages of the Sunday Times, in the Evening Standard, New Yorker, Private Eye and Time, as well as on the walls of the V&A and the Tate, the stages of the English National Opera and the English National Ballet, and cinema screens around the world in the form of Pink Floyd The Wall and Disney's Hercules.

In Long Drawn Out Trip, Gerald tells his life story for the first time. With captivating, often thrilling stories, he takes us back to his wartime childhood and the terrible curse of asthma, through his days as an advertising draughtsman, to his field reporting in Vietnam and the giddy highs of rock 'n' roll. He also reveals the process of cartooning - and the ways that certain subjects have reacted to his visions of them. Along the way he has been car-jacked in Derry, dined with royals, and thoroughly upset Mrs Mary Whitehouse. It is a very personal, wickedly funny and caustically insightful account of an artist's life at the forefront of contemporary culture and society.

You can order Gerald's Long Drawn Out Trip book now through the following direct links: Amazon UK, Amazon.com, Amazon Canada, Amazon France, Amazon Germany, Amazon Spain and Amazon Italy.

Long Drawn Out Trip is followed by another book, designed to complement it - Scarfe: Sixty Years of Being Rude, an incredible looking, fully illustrated retrospective art book which is coming next month. This 576 page book isn't cheap, although looks well worth considering. It can be pre-ordered through Amazon, although please note the price varies considerably from store to store at the moment, so it might be worth "shopping around" to find an Amazon store with a cheaper price for you! Here's the direct links: Amazon UK, Amazon.com, Amazon Canada, Amazon France, Amazon Germany, Amazon Spain and Amazon Italy.

However, if you really want to treat yourself, there are a couple of very special, exclusive editions available at ScarfeBook.com. Both editions from that website contain a signed print, and the Artist’s Edition also includes an original piece of Scarfe's unique artwork!

COMPETITION: With thanks to the publishers, we have three copies of Gerald's Long Drawn Out Trip to give away in our latest competition! To enter, all you need to do is answer this question correctly:

• What was the first piece of work undertaken for Pink Floyd by Gerald?

Email your answer to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it with the subject line of "Gerald Scarfe book competition", and include your name and full mailing address. The closing date is November 11th, 2019, and all entries received by the end of that date will be in with a chance of winning. Just one entry per household please - and best of luck to you all!

UPDATE: This competition is now closed. Thanks to everyone who entered! We've gone through the piles of entries and selected at random the three winners, all of whom knew that Gerald worked with the band back in 1974 on the British Winter Tour, providing the caricature on the tour poster and in the centre pages of the tour programme, and also started work on the Welcome To The Machine film too. A copy of the book is going to: Emily Denyer, California, USA; M. Fischer, Germany; and Steve King, England. Well done to you three, and better luck next time to the hundreds of you who weren't so fortunate this time.  

The new issue of the UK's Uncut Magazine (cover date December 2019) has just gone on sale, is available now in all good stores and available online worldwide, and has a large feature on Pink Floyd, with a number of new interviews with key personnel, as the band gets ready to release The Later Years box set, and 2LP/1CD highlights sets.

In the feature, Uncut's Tom Pinnock talks to David Gilmour, Nick Mason, creative director Aubrey 'Po' Powell and long-time engineer Andy Jackson about regrouping following Waters' departure in December 1985. "By 1984, Roger had very obviously decided that enough was enough for him," Gilmour said, "and I hadn't decided that enough was enough for me. So I imagine I thought, 'Yes, we'll go back to doing [Floyd].'"

"David was very determined not to be told that he can't do it any more," explained Andy Jackson. "In some ways you could interpret Roger saying, 'There is no more Pink Floyd' as [from David's point of view], 'Well, you can't tell me that…' He had the desire to carry on as a band, so he had to make that work really. We were trying to make something that sounded very much of the time, which means of course that as time progresses it ends up sounding dated. As Bob Ezrin was prone to do, at the start of the [Momentary Lapse Of Reason] album he came in with a stack of CDs and said, 'This is what's happening now.' In '86, digital was very much at the forefront. [Dire Straits'] Brothers In Arms had just come out and that had a very particular sound, and that was one bar Bob said we should be aiming for."

Nick Mason: "We sort of laid everything on it. There was a sense of trepidation over what it would be like without Roger, so we slightly over-egged the pudding in terms of lots of session players. Some of it's overproduced, far too much stuff on it…"

"I thought it didn't really sound like a Pink Floyd record," said bassist Guy Pratt, who joined the band in 1987 for their live work, "but it was a very good record. It's very of its time – Floyd were suited to '80s bombast."

Most of you will be aware that the box set includes a remixed and updated version of the AMLOR album. By returning to some of Richard Wright's keyboard parts and recording new drum tracks with Nick Mason, producers David Gilmour and Bob Ezrin are said to have restored the creative balance between the three Pink Floyd members. The release of the One Slip remix today has caused quite a buzz in the Floyd community, as the work undertaken on it seems to have paid handsome dividends. We're even more eager to hear the rest of the album now!

If you can't find the December 2019 issue of Uncut at your local UK store, order online now. The issue comes with Bob Dylan on the cover and an exclusive unreleased Dylan track on the free, cover mounted CD. Elsewhere in the issue, there's Robert Smith, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Prince, Joni Mitchell, Bruce Springsteen, Jeff Lynne, Booker T, Tindersticks and much more...

Now available to buy online is the latest issue (number 20) of the Spanish language Animals Pink Floyd Magazine, published by BD's good friend José Abellán. This extremely well produced, glossy, 48 page magazine was produced with the participation of Aubrey "Po" Powell, and features a previously unseen, unused Hipgnosis image on the cover.

The image is an old design created in 1974 for an avant-garde theatre company that Pink Floyd knew, and the image was then under consideration as the cover design plans for the band's next album. The magazine is being printed in limited numbers, and at the request and express wish of the members of Pink Floyd, Po and Peter Curzon (StormStudios), all proceeds from the sales of this fanzine will go to the non-profit organization AFAPADE - Association of Relatives and Friends of People with Autism and other Developmental Disorders of the Region of Murcia Spain.

The magazine also comes with an A4 card with the Hipgnosis image (a "clean" version without the cover text on it), a couple of postcards, a Waters ITTLWRW die-cut pig, and is signed and numbered by José. The well illustrated contents cover a wide range of recent events: Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets, the Madrid staging of Their Mortal Remains - and an interview with Po about the exhibition, Roger's Us + Them tour and recent studio album, a look at David Gilmour's Pompeii release, the creation/origins of the Animals album and cover, and a piece on the forthcoming box set, The Later Years.

To purchase the fanzine, which as we noted earlier is written in Spanish, please send an email to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it It costs 7 euros plus shipping.