This is certainly an excellent topic for me to post in, given the fact that Pink Floyd is my favourite band. I have every album except the live ones and the Final Cut (which, IMO, can't really be called a real PF album because it sounds much more like a Waters solo album).
Anyway, after Syd Barret left the band and Gilmour replaced him, a couple of albums (More, Ummagumma) were released in which I feel that the band was in a transition phase, looking for their sound amd lacking proper leadership. In Atom Heart Mother, things changed for the better. The band's main leader had arisen: Roger Waters. David Gilmour and ocassionally Rick Wright would come to the fore in terms of songwriting, but the person who contributed most in lyrics and songwriting was Roger.
That having been said, Roger wasn't as good without the other members collaborating with him. For example, a few Waters-only songs (songs written only by him, such as "If" and "Welcome to the Machine") are quite weak, especially musically.
By 1977, when "the Wall" was first released, Waters was dominating the band so much that the sound had changed incredibly. A hint of the increasingly stubborn and domineering Waters had already shown in "Animals," in which all but one song was written by Waters only, and that last song was co-written by him. The only thing that was keeping it all together at that point was that Gilmour was still struggling to insert his influence, and this largely saved the album musically. Lyrically, of course, the album was excellent, because Waters forte is lyrics.
Rick Wright left before "the Final Cut," a sequel to "the Wall," was released (some reports say he was fired by the now egocentric and controlling Waters, who had constantly reprimanded him about his keyboard playing the past few years). Gilmour and Mason started to feel the strain... Gilmour was not allowed any room for his own songwriting anymore, and Waters sung all but one song on the newest album.
After the last three remaining members disbanded in the mid-80s, a few years later Mason, Wright and Gilmour returned again under the Pink Floyd moniker. A court battle ensued between Gilmour and Waters, who still harbored bad feelings. Waters claimed the band could not be allowed the name now that two of the band members, Barret and himself (Pink Floyd had, at one point, in 1968, 5 members: Waters, Wright, Gilmour, Mason and Barret, before he left due to heavy drug use and schizophrenia) had left the band.
But Gilmour won the rights, and Pink Floyd made two more albums together without Waters: "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" (1987) and "the Divison Bell" (1994). Though the albums were a good attempt at recreating the classic Floyd sound, they suffered from a distinct lack or Waters' voice, lyrics, songwriting skills, and bass playing. Worse, they seemed as if they all sounded identical, and were brought down by a heavy overusage of whining Gilmour guitar solos. "The Division Bell" is markedly better than "A Momentary Lapse of Reason," because the latter, on top of the other faults previously listed, had a vintage 80s sound to it *cringes* and weaker songs.
So what is my answer? I liked Floyd when Waters was with the band better, even though I enjoyed the last two albums somewhat. True, he was definetly too overpowering in "the Wall" and "the Final Cut," but from "Atom Heart Mother" to "Animals" he contributed much to the band, so much that they would never be as good after he left.
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