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RIP: Syd Barrett


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OMG! I Just this second ordered Piper at the Gates of Dawn from Amazon. Strange. Floyd has been big in my house lately because my 9 year old is fixed on Dark Side. So I told him about the other, older Floyd and decided to pick up the first album, which I've never made a study of, as I'm not a huge PF fan.

 

Well, RIP Syd. Your music is about to be passed down in my family.

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"Piper at the Gates of Dawn" was, AFAIC, the definitive and best Pink Floyd album -- wildly inventive, with envelope-pushing guitar work, an amazing sound, and great little stories. The later Pink Floyd albums seemed bland by comparison, although they had their own charm.

 

It's really a shame Barrett never got to enjoy the "huge success" part of Pink Floyd's career.

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Pink Floyd has always been a huge inspiration for me. Since I first really got into them with Dark Side (wore the grooves out fast), it took awhile before I worked backward to Piper...and it was like hearing a whole new & exotic flavor.

 

It's a shame that Syd (Shine on You crazy Diamond) apparently had such a sad life. But if any good came of those dark years, it is that he inspired Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here...two monumental albums.

Thanks Syd

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I'm tremendously sad about Syd's passing.

 

Besides the innovation and power of his guitar playing and song writing, I admire his lyrics. His whole lyrical sensibility was unique, and often touchingly beautiful. He really communicated a childlike vulnerability, bittersweet and wise. Imitators have tried, but no one has approached what he accomplished, and at such a young age.

 

This may not be the time or place, but... I've just spent a good half hour reading people's commments on the BBC news website. It seems that every other person quoted Water's "Shine On" lyric. I anticipate that will be the norm on this thread, and I want to say something.

 

I'm of the opinion that Waters got a hell of a lot of mileage from writing about Syd's suffering, and I have my doubts about how much they gave back to him in return. I'm aware that they facilitated his solo albums...and I don't know the details of their relationship with Syd, over the years. But I do know that they certainly used his mental illness as subject matter for at least two hugely selling lps, and it just bugs me. Comparing their fortunes.

 

Compare "shine on, you crazy diamond", to:

 

Oh where are you now

{censored} willow that smiled on this leaf?

When I was alone you promised the stone from your heart

my head kissed the ground

I was half the way down, treading the sand

please

pease lift a hand

I'm only a person whose armbands beat

on his hands, hang tall

Won't you miss me?

Wouldn't you miss me at all?

 

The poppy birds way

swing twigs coffee brands around

brandish her wand with a feathery tongue

my head kissed the ground

I was half the way down, treading the sand

please

please,

please lift a hand

I'm only a person with Eskimo chain

I tattered my brain all the way

Won't you miss me?

Wouldn't you miss me at all?

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Originally posted by sharkbait



I'm of the opinion that Waters got a hell of a lot of mileage from writing about Syd's suffering, and I have my doubts about how much they gave back to him in return. I'm aware that they facilitated his solo albums...and I don't know the details of their relationship with Syd, over the years. But I do know that they certainly used his mental illness as subject matter for at least two hugely selling lps, and it just bugs me. Comparing their fortunes.

 

Gilmour and Waters certainly took a lot of inspiration from Syd Barret, and without him there would be no Pink Floyd, of course! I think, however, that they did try to give him back as much as they could. However, what do you give to someone who has found balance in their life as a recluse?

 

They have always dedicated songs to him in concert, and Gilmour, who was probably closest to Syd Barrett, has generally included a Barrett composition in Floyd tours since the 80's.

 

Apparently, Syd would recieve substantial royalty cheques as a result of this, however, he never bothered to cash them.

 

I think the members of Floyd are all too aware of how much they owe to Syd, and did as much as they could given the circumstances.

 

RIP Syd :(

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I'm thinkng of the summer of '77, hanging with my best friend (and Pink Floyd fanatic) and waiting for his special ordered imports of Syd's solo records...voraciously soaking up all we could find about the heritage of rock 'n' roll and all we missed out on in the sixties.

 

*sigh*

 

Shine, Syd, shine!

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Remember if you happened to know a one in a billion or two genius like Syd, how much he'd mean to you. Saw Roger Waters play live just a week or so ago, and I think twas pretty clear even still how much he means to Waters, as was apparent in the Live 8 gig also.

As I saw someone somewhere say, Syd was the only preson Waters ever looked up to. Clearly an extraordinary soul..if only for him and for us it hadn't all gone wrong. Someone for whom the phrase "ahead of his time" actually means nothing, as he was so unique, once he didn't get to go down the musical paths he'd have traversed, noone else was going to either. Whatever he'd have done will remain an utter mystery, and a direction music won't even open......If that sounds gobbledeegook what I mean to compare to is something like Kraftwerk,unique as they were but in time music was probably going to go down similar paths with or without them. Though it's easy to say that after time has flowed down that path..... Syd was just a one off.

As Rick Wright said, he could have been the greatest of all. Though comparisons are odious.

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I want to clarify what I wrote a few posts back, because I don't want to seem pretentious regarding the other bandmember's real relationship with Barrett, which I know nothing about.

I just see that Waters lyric being used to eulogise Syd, and that started bugging me. It's like, say if Lennon dies, and people start quoting a McCartney lyric over and over.

I'm obviously a Syd-over-Waters guy. Whatever. It's a sad day.

It's nice to read what you all have to say, and hear what he meant to you.

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I'm surprised that there has been so much awareness of Syd Barrett. There are threads and posts all over the place...this was a guy whose star shone so brightly almost 40 years ago, yet here is his, revered and honored.

 

As I said earlier, I thought Piper at the Gates of Dawn is a true masterpiece, and I agree with everyone who said he was one of a kind...a brilliant, innovative musician. I thought that over the years, his role would be forgotten as Pink Floyd scaled far higher commercial heights without him. Yet I don't think they ever scaled higher artistic heights.

 

One of my big disappointments when I gigged during the 60s was when we did a TV show and concert with Pink Floyd. I was really looking forward to meeting Barrett, but this was just after David Gilmour joined full-time and I never got the chance. (FYI, of all of them, I found Nick Mason to be the most open...a very nice guy. Waters was complex, even back then.)

 

It's too bad Barrett can't see what people are writing, and realize how much he put into this world, and how much enjoyment we got from his exceptional talents. It's sad, but he truly did shine on, however briefly...which is more than most people get to do.

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>

 

I think it was difficult for them to figure out what they could do. Apparently he really was out there. I truly don't think they were exploiting him as much as trying to find some way to come to peace themselves with the reality of the situation. They were the ones who kept his memory and his contribution alive, probably out of a combination of gratitude and guilt that they got so much and he got so little...not that any guilt was justified at all, just that it's human nature to say "why him?"

 

I've been in a similar position with a bandmate who lost it, he was never the same, and he died at an early age. I always kept thinking I could have done something, and only later on did I realize that ultimately, there was nothing I could have done.

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Originally posted by Anderton


It's really a shame Barrett never got to enjoy the "huge success" part of Pink Floyd's career.

Artistically no, he didn't, but David Gilmour once said he and the band made sure Barrett and his family were well taken care of financially, and the remastered "best of " compilation released 2 years ago garnered him a fairly large coup as well, but losing your mind just when everything is right at your fingertips must be a hell many of us will never know. R.I.P. Sid. syd

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It's real sad indeed, I must be on of the thousands of fans around hoping he secretly wrote songs all along, and he would just step out to records his songs.

 

I for one think that the floyd's best work was with barrett, but barrett's solo work is as charming as it is heartbreaking at the same time, really, it is packed with emotion.

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Originally posted by BLAblablah

I would love to see a Documentary (or well made movie) based on Syd's life. I wonder if Martin Scorsese was a fan...he would do a great job IMO.

Bear

 

I'm not sure how good you'd think it is but there is a documentary out there already:

 

B00008AWTB.02._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_V1075486

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Originally posted by ThomasH


I'm not sure how good you'd think it is but there is a documentary out there already

 

 

Thanks Thomas! Somehow that had completely flown under my Radar...I will definately be looking for it. I wonder if anyone here has seen it, and if so...what did you think about it?

 

the Pink Floyd & Syd Barrett story

 

Bear

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