The late Richard Wright was living with Barrett at the time and the situation put him in an awkward position, one that hed rather have avoided. Syd was really thrilled he was going to record, recalls Spires. ], UhyesI never saw him again. Bath At present Syd is living quietly in his sparsely furnished London flat among his stereo equipment, piles of paintings and a heap of battered LPs. Syds lyrics could be cosmic or like fairyland; a weird mixture which was exactly what 1967 was all about. This was during the recording sessions for Wish You Were Here, when he turned up at Abbey Road unannounced and in a strange case of random precision as the band was working on Shine On You Crazy Diamond, their tribute song to him. Im treading the backward path, he smiles. Pink Floyd recorded an epic song written about him, "Shine On You Crazy Diamond," but in an interview with the UK's Sunday Times, his sister, Rosemary, called him "my lovably ordinary brother . Syd Barrett interview (circa 1971) Ive been to Chelsea, they told me there were some clothes for you and that you were living with your mother. He looked terrible., Floyd famously elected not to pick him up one day, and already had Gilmour in the band. Eight miles a day, he says. This story is from the December 23rd, 1971 issue of Rolling Stone. Syd Barrett: Thanks very much. He produces a guitar and begins to strum out a new version of Love You, from Madcap. 28.4K subscribers Roger Waters of Pink Floyd in this interview makes it clear that Syd Barrett did indeed go "Crazy" for lack of a better word as we hear this from Roger himself! Watts: What have you been doing since you left The Floyd, apart from making your two albums? I really think the whole thing is based on me being a guitarist and having done the last thing about two or three years ago in a group around England and Europe and The States, and then coming back and hardly having done anything, so I dont really know what to say. I wanted to do a job. var oneSignal_options = {}; I think I would always advocate that sort of thing the luxurious life. I swapped it for the black one, but Ive never played it., Trending They also went into a studio that same day and recorded a first version of Interstellar Overdrive, used as music for the experimental film San Francisco by Anthony Stern. Im sorry I cant speak very coherently, he says, Its rather difficult to think of anybody being really interested in me. I think you might be very successful. We wrote our own songs, played our own music. When it came time to record, Syd reached into his notebook of lyrics, mainly written during a bout of fevered activity in 1966. That occasionally he goes to the house of Richard Wright, The Floyds organist, and sits there silently for hours without speaking. Ive just had an operation, but nothing too serious. Free shipping for many products! The pace of things. Pretty unexciting. Barrett was also a hostage of schizophrenia, a psychological disorder in which people have abnormal perceptions of reality that hinder them from cognitive functioning. Syd Barrett interview. This was a band composition, but most of the other early recordings were songs by Syd, who had established himself as the bands creative innovator. He is in fact alive and as confusing as ever, in the town where he was born, Cambridge. Im glad youre here. He produces a folder containing all his recorded songs to date, neatly typed, with no music. Stay up to date with in depth music reviews, exclusive interviews and widespread coverage of whats happening from your favourite music genre. As he says in Octopus, the madcap laughed at the man on the border.. Syd Barrett, one of the founders of Pink Floyd died at the age 60 after living in seclusion half his life. OneSignal.setDefaultNotificationUrl("http://rockandrollgarage.com"); Pre-Floyd: The Tea Set in 1964 with Syd, Bob Klose, Chris Dennis and Roger Waters. Syd: Yeah thats nice. I dont think the Pink Floyd had any trouble, but I had an awful scene, probably self-inflicted, having a mini and going all over England and things. I suppose it was really just a matter of being a little offhand about things. The Guardian: Excuse me! I never felt so close to a guitar as that silver one with mirrors that I used on stage all the time. This band of youngsters would play at our weekly gigs. Im very good at it. In fact, Syd has made three albums in that time, produced by the Floyd. Recently rediscovered ZBS foundation interview from August 1967 else { In 196667, Barrett was playing lead guitar with Pink Floyd. That he once went for an afternoon drive and ended up in Ibiza. He'd been to art school. Syd: It wasnt really a war. oneSignal_options['notifyButton']['enable'] = true; A:No, no thats okay. I only read last week that its not finished. Syd Barrett, Rolling Stone, December 1971. These three later became the main creative leaders of Pink Floyd, each of them rising to the front during their own era, connected in origin and friendship from the Cambridge days. He said, Hi Im Roger, Ive got my own band, weve just done some recording and are changing our name to Pink Floyd., Jenny became Syds girlfriend (and Jennifer Gentle in Lucifer Sam). document.documentElement.classList.add( Thanks very much. The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, mostly composed by Syd, is considered to be one of the greatest British psychedelic albums. Some 3-4 years later the spelling would change after seeing a bassist in the Riverside Seven, a traditional jazz band, named Sid Barrett. Your details are kept safe. The doomed poet. Syd: Well, I havent bought a lot. Syd Barrett interview (Jan 1970) Terrapin #17, 1975 Syd Barrett has returned. window._oneSignalInitOptions = oneSignal_options; Syd: Well, I dont know, it dont seem to have much to do with the job. Syd: I feel though the record would still be the thing to do. Syd: Well, of course, living in Cambridge I have to find something to do. And it was, of course, at Londons first psychedelic dungeon UFO that the Floyd found their initial following among the early freaks when flower power was something very real to a lot of people. He told us thats where we wanted to be., In December 1964, 18-year-old Syd met 15-year-old Jenny Spires at Cambridges Union Cellar. MTB: 0021377/MG, David Lee Roths opinion on Freddie Mercury and Queen, Paul Stanley doesnt agree that Rock and Roll is dead, Foreigners Kelly Hansen talks about Lou Gramm, Phil Collen talks about the feeling of touring with Mtley Cre, New AC/DC photos leak and website says new song will be released, Led Zeppelins John Bonham about his drumming influences. oneSignal_options['notifyButton']['showCredit'] = true; At the end of that April, Pink Floyd was the closing act at the 14 Hour Technicolor Dream festival at Alexandra Palace, and left an ever-lasting impression on those in attendance, as the sun rose and streamed in through the windows, casting reflections on Syds mirrored guitar. Warren Dosanjh, Syd Barrett's first manager. He is the Icarus of the 1960s and his fall was leapt upon by the moral majority, drugs are bad!, etc, so he also became a poster boy for the wrong reasons., Poor Syd, concludes Jenny Fabian. The result, of course, left his bandmates with no choice but to remove him from Pink Floyd in 1968 and his final interview was a portrait of a shadow of his former self. If I was going to play properly, I should need some really good people.. They were playing on Madcap, except for Kevin Ayers. Syd: Yes, very much. oneSignal_options['notifyButton'] = { }; After the American tour, he was finished. Symbolic? Syd was a notable and popular bohemian figure on the Cambridge scene, swapping guitar chords with David Gilmour and avidly enjoying a wide range of musical influences from jazz to obscure blues combos. See www.barrettbook.com. That he was thrown out of The Pink Floyd. Syd was pleasantly surprised that the LP had sold well, especially as there was no great hype involved. From then on Sid was Syd until in the 1970s, when he reverted to his original Roger. But, like the tragic spaceman in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Barrett had been cut adrift to float in his private inner world until he died, leaving one of rocks most mysteriously evocative legends. The whole saga starts, I suppose at least for convenience's sake, with a band called The Abdabs. I wasnt always this introverted, he says, I think young people should have a lot of fun. Goodthere you are. Watts: Dont you fancy playing live again after two years? I want to record my next LP before I go on to anything else, and Im writing for that at the moment., It was while Syd was at school in Cambridge that he started learning the guitar. Syd would always be writing songs in a notebook, which hed tell me were written for or about me, like Bike. He was able to access a time we all wanted to go back to: the magic garden and innocence, says Jenny Fabian, who danced to the Floyd at UFO, met Syd in his later twilight zone phase and described him in her seminal novel Groupie. Watts: Would you say, therefore, you were a difficult person to get on with? The fans of Syd since 5/19/97: var site="sm4sydbarrett" I suddenly saw that I didnt have to be transatlantic. Hed named the band and was writing most of their music, including the only two hit singles they ever had. I saw him when he got back from the States and he had to go on the Hendrix tour. Ive got a very irregular head. Syd Barrett - The breakdown of Syd as told by his sister and band members - Radio Broadcast 09/06/11 Raised On Radio 974K views 4 years ago PINK FLOYD'S RICHARD WRIGHT UNFILTERED INTERVIEW. Brian Freddy Foskett, formerly a jazz drummer with the Riverside Seven, took Roger to the YMCA in Alexandra Street to hear the band play and Roger decided to put the y into his nickname to avoid confusion with the bass player. He captured the times.. function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} Ive got things like Ma Rainey recently. Occasionally Id bump into him in Sainsburys or in town, or see him in B&Q buying wood, says Spires. After college I did a postgraduate degree in digital communication. Syd leaves the cellar and goes up to a sedate little room full of pictures of himself with his family. Two proposed singles were recorded but shelved, due to their dark nature and non-commercial potential: Scream Thy Last Scream (Old Woman With A Casket) and Vegetable Man. Given the situation, the band members made the decision to simply not pick him for their next show and Syd would never perform in public again. And so Syd Barrett, now back in the public eye after two years, carries on in his own way doing what he wants as he wants to. Learn More{{/message}}, {{#message}}{{{message}}}{{/message}}{{^message}}It appears your submission was successful. 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