This has to be Pink Floyd sticksman Nick Mason’s finest hour! The drummer wowed fans with his thunderous groove on “One of These Days,” a drop from the English act’s historic Live in Pompeii performance, which was recently re-released in 4K. While there are plenty of great percussive moments in the video, by far the most replayed section was at 4:52 when Mason sends his drumstick flying after a particularly solid thwack on the snare drum.
The Englishman kept his cool, though, expertly keeping the drum fill going with his left hand before retrieving another stick and thundering around the drums into the next riff. “One of These Days” largely centers around Mason’s drumming. However, there are plenty of other great moments, such as Roger Waters’ hypnotic bass line and David Gilmour’s genius electric slide guitar playing. The Music Man is a lifelong Floyd fan, and it’s great to see the legendary concert given such a high-quality re-release 53 years later.
Pink Floyd uploaded the 4K remaster of “One of These Days” to YouTube in April 2025, and it has since hit 900,000 views. Many of the top comments addressed Mason’s ability to seamlessly recover from the stick break, while others added comments such as “This was about the moment I decided that Nick Mason is an incredible percussionist, and he doesn’t get enough credit” and “Am I alone in thinking this performance is even better than the studio version?”
Pink Floyd recently uploaded a number of clips from the Live at Pompeii remaster. Apart from “One of These Days,” most of the clips are snippets, although the band did treat fans to a nearly six-minute upload of “Echoes – Part 1” from the concert. The Music Man readers may recall that “Echoes” has long been the most popular song from the album. It features a glorious guitar solo from Gilmour, along with some heavenly harmonized vocals from the guitarist and keyboardist Rick Wright.
Pink Floyd recorded Live at Pompeii from October 4 to 7, 1971, and released the concert film the following September. The film captured the trailblazing English rockers at the peak of their powers and was also notable for being shot in the ancient Roman amphitheatre located in Pompeii, Italy. Live at Pompeii has also proved to be a historic and influential concert, as it prompted numerous bands to recreate the film’s then-novel idea of filming a concert without an audience.