Syd Barrett

[harkrider]

For those of you who don't know Syd, which is probably everyone, here are his vitals:

He founded Pink Floyd, waaay back in 1966.  It might have been slightly before that, actually.  He was very good looking.  He had a great voice.  He wrote several truly "great" songs.  He was a pioneer in psychedelic music, so much so, in fact, that he inspired John Lennon, and the rest of the Beatles, who, while recording "Abbey Road" at Abbey Road studios, crossed paths with Barrett and "the Floyd" during their "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" sessions.

"Piper" was a great album.  It's the best Pink Floyd album, in my opinion, because of its sheer ingenuity.  Barrett sang songs about wildly unpopular themes -- "childhood wonder" for the most part.  Unfortunately, Barrett went completely insane with the advent of fame.  LSD played a big part.  Syd is perhaps the best known "acid casualty" in rock and roll.

But that didn't stop him from writing several other great songs.  He did some solo work, notably Terrapin, Clowns and Jugglers,  and Swan Lee (Silas Lang).  His later stuff is reminiscent of Girly Sound, where there is nothing but his guitar, his voice, and his incredible imagination. 

He is among my favorite musicians, right after Lou Reed and Liz Phair.

[TrampolineFrSpace]

It is said that "Wish You Were Here" referred to Syd and how they were sad that he wasn't a part of the group when they finally hit it big with Dark Side of the Moon.

I'm a big Pink Floyd fan, but really haven't heard the early stuff with Syd.  I guess it's now on my to-do list.

[TrampolineFrSpace]

As I've mentioned in the LP Forum, I went out and purchased Pink Floyd - London 1966/1967.  I've only heard this a couple of times, but it is growing on me.

I've also seen Relics in the store and will probably pick this one up as well.  It appears that Relics is a mix of both Syd Barrett Pink Floyd and David Gilmour Pink Floyd.

...
P.S., I edited this post to make it easier to read with anything else but the standard theme for this forum.  I removed the colored font.

[harkrider]

I'd recommend  Piper at the Gates of Dawn, and then his solo works: The Madcap Laughs and Opel.  It's really too bad we can't just share MP3s for fringe artitsts like Barrett.  Doing so would only promote their popularity.

On the topic of fringe artitsts, that guy who runs the Judee Sill site had something interesting to say about file sharing.  Evidently, after he made some of her obscure work available, her popularity increased, so much so that the record label got interested and told him to remove the files.  It's a good example of what file sharing can do in lieu of promotion.

[TrampolineFrSpace]

I finally got Piper at the Gates of Dawn.  It is an excellent album.

I didn't need both stereo and mono versions of it.