Peter Watts | |
---|---|
Born | Peter Anthony Watts 16 January 1946
Bedford,
Bedfordshire, England |
Died | 2 August 1976
Notting Hill,
London, England | (aged 30)
Occupations | |
Employer | Pink Floyd |
Spouses | Myfanwy Edwards-Roberts
(
m. 1966;
div. 1972)Patricia Deighton (
m. 1976) |
Children |
Peter Anthony Watts (16 January 1946 – 2 August 1976) was an English road manager and sound engineer who worked with rock band Pink Floyd. [1] [2]
Watts was born on 16 January 1946, in Bedford, Bedfordshire, England, the son of Jane Patricia Grace (née Rolt; born 1923, in Naivasha, Kenya Colony) [3] and Anthony Watts. Watts had one older brother, Michael, and one younger sister, Patricia. Watts' mother remarried, to Anthony Daniells, in 1989. [4]
Watts was the road manager for Pretty Things before joining Pink Floyd as their first experienced road manager. [5] Alongside fellow roadie Alan Styles, [1] he appears on the rear cover of Pink Floyd's 1969 album Ummagumma, [1] shown with the band's van and equipment laid out on a runway at Biggin Hill Airport, with the intention of replicating the "exploded" drawings of military aircraft and their payloads, [1] which were popular at the time. On the 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon, [1] he contributed the repeated laughter on " Brain Damage", and was also heard in the album's overture, " Speak to Me". [1] His wife Patricia 'Puddie' Watts [6] was responsible for the line about the "geezer" who was "cruisin' for a bruisin'" used in the segue between " Money" and " Us and Them", and the words "I never said I was frightened of dying." heard near the end of " The Great Gig in the Sky". [7]
In 1966, Watts married Myfanwy Edwards-Roberts, the daughter of a Welsh father and Australian mother, who was an antiques dealer and costume and set designer. [8] They had two children, Ben (b. 1967; a photographer), and Naomi (b. 1968; an actress).
The couple divorced in 1972. [9] After the divorce, the children were raised by their grandparents and their mother as she built a career. The family relocated to London.[ citation needed]
Peter Watts left Pink Floyd's service in 1974. In 1976, he married Patricia Deighton, known as "Puddie", who can also be heard on The Dark Side of the Moon. [10]
In August 1976, Watts was found dead in a flat in Notting Hill, London, from a heroin overdose. [11] [12] After his death, Pink Floyd provided financial support to his two young children. The money allowed the family to move to Sydney, Australia, in 1982, where Edwards-Roberts became part of a burgeoning film industry. [13]