Roger Waters–led era: 1976–1985

During this era, Waters asserted more and more control over Pink Floyd's output. Wright's influence became largely inconsequential, and he was fired from the band during the recording of The Wall. Much of the music from this period is considered secondary to the lyrics, which explore Waters' feelings about his father's death in World War II and his increasingly cynical attitude towards political figures such as Margaret Thatcher and Mary Whitehouse. Although still finely nuanced, the music grew more guitar-based at the expense of keyboards and saxophone, both of which became (at best) part of the music's background texture along with the obligatory sound effects. A full orchestra (even larger than the brass ensemble from Atom Heart Mother) plays a significant role on The Wall and especially The Final Cut.

By January 1977, and the release of Animals (UK #2, U.S. #3), the band's music came under increasing criticism from some quarters in the new punk rock sphere as being too flabby and pretentious, having lost its way from the simplicity of early rock and roll. Animals was, however, considerably more guitar-driven than the previous albums, due to either the influence of the burgeoning punk-rock movement or the fact that the album was recorded at Pink Floyd's new (and somewhat incomplete) Britannia Row Studios. The album was also the first to not have a single songwriting credit for Rick Wright. Animals again contained lengthy songs tied to a theme, this time taken in part from George Orwell's Animal Farm, which used Pigs, Dogs and Sheep as metaphors for members of contemporary society. Despite the prominence of guitar, keyboards and synthesisers still play an important role on Animals, but the saxophone and female vocal work that defined much of the previous two albums' sound is absent. The result is a more hard-rock effort overall, bookended by two parts of a quiet acoustic piece. Many critics did not respond well to the album, finding it tedious and bleak, although some celebrated it for almost those very reasons. For the cover artwork, a giant inflatable pig was commissioned to float between the chimney towers of London's Battersea Power Station. However, the wind made the pig balloon difficult to control, and in the end it was necessary to matte a photo of the pig balloon onto the album cover. The pig was created by Dutch industrial designer and artist Theo Botschuijver. The pig nevertheless became one of the enduring symbols of Pink Floyd, and inflatable pigs were a staple of Pink Floyd live performances from then on.

1979's epic rock opera The Wall, conceived by Waters, dealt with the themes of loneliness and failed communication, which were expressed by the metaphor of a wall built between a rock artist and his audience. The deciding moment in which to conceive The Wall was during a concert in Montreal, Canada in which Roger Waters spat on an audience member as he attempted to climb up on stage — it was this point where Waters felt the alienation between audience and band. This album gave Pink Floyd renewed acclaim and their only chart-topping single with Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2). The Wall also included the future concert staples Comfortably Numb and Run Like Hell, with the former in particular becoming a cornerstone of album-oriented rock and classic-rock radio playlists as well as one of the group's best-known songs. The album was co-produced by Bob Ezrin, a friend of Waters who shared songwriting credits on The Trial and from whom Waters later distanced himself after Ezrin shot his mouth off to the press. Even more than during the Animals sessions, Waters was asserting his artistic influence and leadership over the band, using the band's perilous financial situation to his advantage, which prompted increased conflicts with the other members. The music had become distinctly more hard-rock, although the large orchestrations on some tracks recalled an earlier period, and there are a few quieter songs interspersed throughout (such as Goodbye Blue Sky, Nobody Home, and Vera). Wright's influence was completely minimalized, and he was fired from the band during recording, only returning on a fixed wage for the live shows in support of the album. Ironically, Wright was the only member of Pink Floyd to make any money from the Wall concerts, which were only performed in several cities — including Dortmund, London, Los Angeles, New York — over multiple nights, the rest covering the extensive cost overruns of their most spectacular concerts yet.

However, in 1989, after the Berlin Wall came down in Germany, Roger Waters agreed to perform The Wall live in concert, at the site of the former Berlin Wall.

Despite never hitting #1 in the UK (it reached #3), The Wall spent 15 weeks atop the U.S. charts in 1980. Critics praised it, and it has been certified 23x platinum by the RIAA, for sales of 11.5 million copies of the double album in the U.S. alone. The huge commercial success of The Wall made Pink Floyd the only artists since the Beatles to have the best-selling albums of two years (1973 and 1980) in less than a decade.

A film entitled Pink Floyd: The Wall was released in 1982, incorporating almost all of the music from the album. The film, written by Waters and directed by Alan Parker, starred Boomtown Rats founder Bob Geldof, who re-recorded many of the vocals, and featured animation by noted British artist and cartoonist Gerald Scarfe. Film critic Leonard Maltin referred to the movie as the world's longest rock video, and certainly the most depressing, but it grossed over US$14 million at the North American box office. A song which first appeared in the movie, When the Tigers Broke Free, was released as a single on a limited basis. This song was finally made widely available on the compilation album Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd and the re-release of The Final Cut. Also in the film is the song What Shall We Do Now?, which was cut out of the original album due to the time constraints of vinyl records. The only songs from the album not used were Hey You and The Show Must Go On.

Their 1983 studio album, The Final Cut, was dedicated by Waters to his father, Eric Fletcher Waters. Even darker in tone than The Wall, this album re-examined many previous themes, while also addressing then-current events, including Waters' anger at Britain's participation in the Falklands War, the blame for which he laid squarely at the feet of political leaders (The Fletcher Memorial Home). It concludes with a cynical and frightening glimpse at the possibility of nuclear war (Two Suns in the Sunset). Michael Kamen and Andy Bown contributed keyboard work in lieu of Richard Wright, whose departure had not been formally announced before the album's release.

Though technically a Pink Floyd album, the LP's front cover displayed no words, only the back cover reading: The Final Cut — A requiem for the post-war dream by Roger Waters, performed by Pink Floyd: Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Nick Mason. Roger Waters received the sole songwriting credit for the entire record, which became a prototype in sound and form for later Waters solo projects. Waters has since said that he offered to release the record as a solo album, but the rest of the band rejected this idea. However, in his book Inside Out, drummer Nick Mason says that no such discussions ever took place. Gilmour reportedly asked Waters to hold back the release of the album so that he could write enough material to contribute, but this request was refused. The music's tone is largely similar to The Wall's but somewhat quieter and softer, resembling songs like Nobody Home more than Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2). It is also more repetitive, with certain leitmotifs cropping up continually. Only moderately successful with fans by Floyd's standards (UK #1, U.S. #6), but reasonably well-received by critics, the album yielded one minor radio hit (albeit in bowdlerised form), Not Now John, the only hard-rock song on the album (and the only one partially sung by Gilmour). The arguments between Waters and Gilmour at this stage were rumoured to be so bad that they were supposedly never seen in the recording studio simultaneously, and Gilmour's co-producer credit was dropped from the album sleeve (though he received attendant royalties). There was no tour for the album, although parts of it have since been performed live by Waters on his subsequent solo tours.

After The Final Cut Capitol Records released the compilation Works, which made the 1970 Waters track Embryo available for the first time on a Pink Floyd album, although the track had been released on the 1970 VA compilation Picnic - A Breath of Fresh Air on the Harvest Records label. The band members then went their separate ways and spent time working on individual projects. Gilmour was the first to release his solo album About Face in March 1984. Wright joined forces with Dave Harris of Fashion to form a new band, Zee, which released the experimental album Identity a month after Gilmour's project. In May 1984, Waters released The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking, a concept album once proposed as a Pink Floyd project. Waters had written this at the same time as The Wall and during proposal of both, the band selected The Wall. A year after his bandmates' projects, Mason released the album Profiles, a collaboration with Rick Fenn of 10cc which featured guest appearances by Gilmour and UFO keyboardist Danny Peyronel.