"Another Brick in the Wall" is a three-part composition on Pink Floyd's eleventh studio album The Wall (1979), written by the bassist, Roger Waters. "Part 2", a protest song against corporal punishment in schools and rigid and abusive schooling, features a children's choir. At the suggestion of the producer, Bob Ezrin, Pink Floyd incorporated elements of disco.
"Part 2" was Pink Floyd's first UK single since "Point Me at the Sky" (1968). It sold more than four million copies worldwide and topped singles charts in 14 countries, including the UK and the US, and was the UK Christmas No. 1 of 1979. It was nominated for a Grammy Award and was ranked number 384 on Rolling Stones list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time".
Concept
The three parts of "Another Brick in the Wall" appear on Pink Floyd's 1979 rock opera studio album The Wall. They are essentially one verse each, although Part 2 sees its own verse sung twice: once by Floyd members, and the second time by the children's choir along with Waters and Gilmour. During "Part 1", the protagonist, Pink, begins building a metaphorical wall around himself following the death of his father. In "Part 2", traumas involving his overprotective mother and abusive schoolteachers become bricks in the wall. Following a violent breakdown in "Part 3", Pink dismisses everyone he knows as "just bricks in the wall."
Lyricist, co-lead vocalist and conceptual leader Roger Waters wrote "Part 2" as a protest against oppressive schooling. "Another Brick in the Wall" appears in the film based on the album. In the "Part 2" sequence, children enter a school and march in unison through a meat grinder, becoming "putty-faced" clones, before rioting and burning down the school.
Recording
At the suggestion of the producer Bob Ezrin, Pink Floyd added elements of disco, which was popular at the time. According to the guitarist, David Gilmour:
Gilmour recorded his guitar solo using a 1955 Gibson Les Paul Gold Top guitar with P-90 pickups. The American session guitarist Lee Ritenour said in a 2024 interview that Ezrin had him record some ideas for the solo, as Pink Floyd could not decide how to end it. Though his parts were not used, he said he detected his influence in the last bars of Gilmour's solo.
Despite his reservations about the disco element, Gilmour felt the final song sounded like Pink Floyd.
Alun Renshaw, the head of music at the school, was enthusiastic, and said later: "I wanted to make music relevant to the kids – not just sitting around listening to Tchaikovsky. I thought the lyrics were great – 'We don't need no education, we don't need no thought control' ... I just thought it would be a wonderful experience for the kids." The children's choir in the recording featured 23 students, who practised for about a week to prepare. Renshaw hid the lyrics from the headteacher, Margaret Maden, fearing she might stop the recording. Maden said: "I was only told about it after the event, which didn't please me. But on balance it was part of a very rich musical education." According to Ezrin, when he played the children's vocals to Waters, "There was a total softening of his face, and you just knew that he knew it was going to be an important record." Though the school received a payment of £1,000, there was no arrangement for royalties for the children. Following a change to the copyright law of the United Kingdom in 1996, they became eligible for royalties from broadcasts. After the royalties agent Peter Rowan traced the choir members through the social network service Friends Reunited and other means, they successfully lodged a claim for royalties with the Performing Artists' Media Rights Association in 2004. It was also the Christmas number one of 1979 and the final number one of the decade in the UK. It remained at the top until mid-January, in the process also becoming the first UK number of the 1980s. In the US, it reached number 57 on the disco chart. The single sold over 4 million copies worldwide. Cashbox described it as a "catchy but foreboding selection, with its ominously steady drum work and angry lyrics." Critic Mike Cormack said "Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2" was a "magnificent achievement: its catchy rhythm undercutting the darkness of the song's theme, the irony of its chorus belying the acidulous disdain of the lyric, Waters' quality as a wordsmith on display with the excellent phrase 'dark sarcasm', and the simplicity of its structure giving it a tight focus."
The song won Waters the 1983 British Academy Award for Best Original Song for its appearance in The Wall film. "Part 2" was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Performance by a Rock Duo or Group. It appeared at number 384 on Rolling Stones 2010 list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time".
The lyrics attracted controversy. The Inner London Education Authority described the song as "scandalous", and according to Renshaw, then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher "hated it".
Charts
Weekly charts
{|class="wikitable sortable"
! Chart (1979–80)
! Peak<br />position
|-
| Australia (Kent Music Report)
| align="center" | 2
|-
|-
|-
| Canada Top Singles (RPM)
| align="center" | 1
|-
| Denmark (Hitlisten)
| align="center" | 5
|-
| Finland (Suomen virallinen lista)
| align="center" | 1
|-
|-
| Ireland (IRMA)
| align="center" | 1
|-
| Israel Singles Chart
| align="center" | 1
|-
| Italy (Musica e Dischi)
| align="center" | 2
|-
|-
|-
|-
|-
| Portugal Singles Chart
| align="center" | 1
|-
| Spain (PROMUSICAE)
| align="center" | 2
|-
|-
|-
|-
|-
|-
| US Cash Box Top 100
| align="center" | 1
|-
|}
{|class="wikitable"
! Chart (2012)
! Peak<br />position
|-
|}
{|class="wikitable"
! Chart (2014)
! Peak<br />position
|-
|}
Year-end charts
{|class="wikitable sortable"
! Chart (1980)
! Rank
|-
| Australia (Kent Music Report)
| align="center" | 4
|-
| Canada
| align="center" | 1
|-
| Germany
| align="center" | 2
|-
|Italy (TV Sorrisi e Canzoni)
| align="center"| 9
|-
| Netherlands (Dutch Top 40)
| align="center" | 61
|-
| Netherlands (Single Top 100)
| align="center" | 44
|-
| New Zealand
| align="center" | 5
|-
| South Africa
| align="center" | 8
|-
| Switzerland
| align="center" | 1
|-
| US Billboard Hot 100
| align="center" | 2
|-
| US Cash Box
| align="center" | 3
|-
|}
All-time charts
{|class="wikitable plainrowheaders"
! scope="col" | Chart
! scope="col" | Position
|-
! scope="row" | US Billboard Hot 100 (1958–2018)
| style="text-align:center;" | 146
|-
! scope="row" | UK Singles (Official Charts Company)
| align="center" | 104
|}