David Gilmour and the infinite note

While recording The Dark Side of the Moon , the members of Pink Floyd were obsessed with one idea: creating a sound they couldn't forget. One day, while David Gilmour was improvising on his Stratocaster at Abbey Road Studios, Roger Waters challenged him: “Play just one note… but make it last forever.”

Gilmour smiled, didn't say a word, and dimmed the studio lights. He adjusted his delay pedal, fine-tuned the vibrato to perfection, and let a single tone flow like a sustained, dense, and emotional wave. The note seemed to expand up the walls, float in the air, envelop everyone in the room. The engineers stopped. No one spoke. It was only an instant... but everyone felt they were listening to something eternal.

That moment wasn't captured on tape, but it stayed with everyone who witnessed it. Gilmour would later say in an interview: "The perfect note isn't the one you hit. It's the one you let vibrate."

Years later, many fans believe that moment was the seed of what would become the solo in “Time”—a simple but emotionally charged sequence that hits home without speed or fireworks.

In a world filled with noise, Gilmour showed that sometimes a single note is enough to say it all. Since then, that has been the quest of many guitarists: not to play more, but to play better… or to play something that won't be forgotten .