The career of Syd Barrett is the story of one of rock's great failures- even among the esteemed company of Brian Jones, Arthur Lee, Ian Curtis and Kurt Cobain, Syd's plummet from Pink Floyd's creative force to a haunted recluse is uniquely tragic. Tonight we will play Syd's final studio album "Barrett".
Syd joined Roger Waters, Rick Wright and Nick Mason to form Pink Floyd in the mid-60s. Originally styling themselves in the mold of the British pop style following Beatlemania, Pink Floyd under Syd's leadership melded the melodies of The Beatles with the raw guitar noise and spacey electronic atmospheres of their live shows. After charting with two Barrett creations, the off-kilter "See Emily Play" and "Arnold Layne", in 1967 the band recorded “Piper at the Gates of Dawn,” the only album to feature Syd’s full participation.
The music on "Piper" was playful, even whimsical at times; the titular reference to the Wind in the Willows reflected Syd’s deeper interest in very English storybook eccentricities. While their focus in the studio was on pop singles, the band's live shows in London were all-night psychedelic affairs (laser light shows, perhaps?) featuring long drugged-out instrumental pieces. The hallucinogenic drugs, LSD in particular, which fueled this creativity took a particular toll on Syd, resulting in increasingly erratic behavior- arriving late (or not at all) for shows, sometimes detuning his guitar mid-performance, or even playing one or two chords for the duration of a show. The strain of the drugs was compounded by Syd’s likely undiagnosed schizophrenia. By the time of Pink Floyd's November 1967 tour of the United States, Syd was nearly a burned out shell of his former self. On “Dick Clark's American Bandstand”, Syd simply refused to move his lips as the band lip-synched to his “Apples and Oranges". Frustrated, upon their return to England, the other members of the group brought in David Gilmour as a replacement guitarist (ironically telling him to "play like Syd"). Hopes of Syd becoming a studio-only member of the band, like the Beach Boys' sun-damaged genius Brian Wilson, were soon dashed, and Syd broke with Pink Floyd prior to the release of their second album in 1968, "A Saucerful of Secrets". Although Pink Floyd continued without Syd, they never recaptured the playful humor and literal mad energy of their work with Barrett.
Syd spent the next year or so holed up in his London apartment, until when in March of 1969 he contacted his former label and asked for recording studio time. The resultant 1970 LP, "The Madcap Laughs" as recorded was simply with Syd playing guitar and singing. Putting former conflicts aside, Waters and Gilmour then supplemented the tracks with the help of Soft Machine members Robert Wyatt, Mike Ratledge and Hugh Hopper. In November 1970, a second LP appeared, the darker "Barrett". Tonight’s feature is an album of challenging music - full of inconsistent rhythms, hesitation, and forays off-key and off microphone. The two albums are the product of a breakdown, and for every moment of brilliance there is another moment when it sounds if Syd is an artist merely going through the motions of playing.
“Syd doesn't see many people these days. Visiting him is like intruding into a very private world. 'I'm disappearing', he says, 'avoiding most things.' He seems very tense, ill at ease. Hollow-cheeked and pale, his eyes reflect a permanent state of shock. He has a ghostly beauty which one normally associates with poets of old. His hair is short now, uncombed, the wavy locks gone. The velvet pants and new green snake skin boots show some attachment to the way it used to be. 'I'm treading the backward path,' he smiles. 'Mostly, I just waste my time.' He walks a lot. 'Eight miles a day,' he says. 'It's bound to show. But I don't know how.'
'I'm sorry I can't speak very coherently,' he says, 'It's rather difficult to think of anybody being really interested in me. But you know, man, I am totally together. I even think I should be.' Occasionally, Syd responds directly to a question. Mostly his answers are fragmented, a stream of consciousness… 'I'm full of dust and guitars,' he says. 'The only work I've done the last two years is interviews. I'm very good at it.'”
- Mick Rock, Rolling Stone, Dec 1971
For more, go to The Syd Barrett Archives, http://www.sydbarrett.net.
Notes by Mike
