The Best Reference

The solo in Wearing the Inside Out at 5:52 directly quotes the solo of Comfortably Numb at 5:30 (in this video above).

This is a hugely important and meaningful thing for Gilmour to do in this particular song and yet only lasts a couple of seconds.

Wearing the Inside Out is a song written by Rick Wright, and his first song that he sings solo, let alone writes lyrics for, since Time on DSOTM. It is absolutely his most personal song, showing a very seldom seen side to the quietest person in Pink Floyd. In this song he is speaking his inside emotions out; speaking of the past and the fact that by doing so he is regaining a voice he has lost. Because of this, the feelings in the song are intensely vulnerable and the song itself has a very tentative and fragile mood to it. As well as that, because the song is about the past, and only just coming out of silence after so long, it has a bitterness from anger, sadness, and almost self-righteousness to it. You aren’t quite sure if the song is about Rick, or it is about Roger Waters- who pushed him towards his silence; who the bitterness in the song blames for his silence.

Look at him now
He's paler somehow
But he's coming round
He's starting to choke
It's been so long since he spoke
Well he can have the words right from my mouth

The whole of the Wall is about Water’s anger; the bricks are his reasons, the Wall becomes a monstrous defense-mechanism structure that only goes to trap and disembody the protagonist from his self. Thus, when it came to putting this deeply personal struggle into music, Waters was obviously extremely vulnerable; bearing his heart on his sleeve. He was totalitarian over the recording process and extremely controlling. Thus, for many reasons, but mainly because of Waters’ anger, during the time of recording Comfortably Numb, Wright was at the absolute peak of his silence, not allowed a voice in the creative process let alone as a friend or a human being. And so he exiled himself from the band, refusing to speak to Waters and indeed anyone in the band. Wright’s voice was lost in the maelstrom of Roger’s hugely fragile ego. And Wright could not express himself in any way- apart from this taking himself out of the band, which is a very loud, but more passive expression of reactive anger. Wrights rage was bottled up and silenced:

"I murmured a vow of silence and now // I don't even hear when I think aloud"

Comfortably Numb itself is Roger’s perspective- it is his expression of disaffection, disembodiment, separation, and rage made impotent by the demands of having to perform constantly. It is about not having a voice, ironically, in the same way that Wright was not allowed expression. It is a song that Waters wrote after an experience where he was stricken with terrible stomach pain just before a gig, and a Doctor gave him painkillers so he could get on with the show. He used this experience between a doctor and himself as a metaphor for the similarly intense feeling of disaffection that he felt between aspects of himself, the audience and his fellow band mates. The song’s outlook of this pain, in contrast to the hindsight and remorse in Wearing the Inside Out, is one where this pain of separation and disaffection is a burden merely to be shouldered for a greater good, for the good of the audience, at the expense of Waters.

"Just a little pin prick

There'll be no more aaaaaaaah!

But you may feel a little sick

Can you stand up?

I do believe it's working, good

That'll keep you going through the show

Come on, it's time to go."

Significantly, the words “time to go” are repeated over and over again in “Bring the Boys Back Home”, the song preceding Comfortably Numb, as a relentless knocking; a Stage Manager’s call to the stage. As well as that, “The Show Must Go On” is the song directly after Comfortably Numb, further emphasising Waters’ inability to express his pain because of the pressure of being a producing artist.  Anger then forms from this bottled pressure, and anger turns to impotent rage because he must he must perform without a break. 

In both situations, anger and painful emotions are firmly kept locked inside. Being Comfortably Numb is a notion where one has to just get through it; the word Comfortable becomes tongue in cheek, because the numbness; the inability to express frustration, becomes the real pain.

This can be heard in the song itself, by switching from B minor to D major. The pure angst of being numb- the impotent rage itself- is only expressed in Gilmour’s screaming guitar solo. 

So when Gilmour, who was obviously part of this furious cold war, refers back to Comfortably Numb through his guitar, which is his way of expressing his voice in this song, Wright's narrative about finally becoming less numb, finally speaking out without fear, being heard, and being able to hear his true self, is reinforced by recalling all of the pain and lack of expression that Comfortably Numb is not only about, but brought about in its recording. The pain of Comfortably Numb is the reason that Wright had to bottle up his emotions inside in the first place, and Comfortably Numb itself perfectly describes the situation of impotent rage. Gilmour playing it in this song highlights the reasons that Wearing the Inside Out is thus a song so meaningful. The pure vulnerability of Wright speaking out for the first time is both righteous and jubilant in the fact that he is not numb anymore, but it is also a challenge towards Roger to do the same. And Gilmour, who sends out his own challenges to Roger in other songs in the album, refers back to the past with his solo in a way that highlights with deep remorse the fact that both Wright and Waters, were equally too numb and clouded by anger to reconcile with each other. Thus, the song is a hopeful, and even revolutionary song from a feeling of complete stagnation, towards a cathartic expression of fermented, painful feelings of remorse, loss and bitterness, that are all compounded by this hindsight that screams out not only in Gilmours solo, but the use of the farfisa organ that was so heavily used in Wish You Were Here. Overall, it is just a bloody great song and I love it.