Sunday, July 15, 2007

Shine On, You Crazy Diamond


The July 2007 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry has a lot of good stuff in it this month, including this tribute to Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd, who died last year.

Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett (1946–2006)
by Paolo Fusar-Poli, M.D.

Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett was both the founding member of one of the most legendary rock bands and probably the most famous rock star to develop psychosis. He formed the band that would become Pink Floyd in 1965, amalgamating the first names of two American bluesmen, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council.

Recorded at Abbey Road Studios, inspired by LSD (1), and driven by Barrett’s songwriting, singing, and otherworldly guitar solos, the first album, "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" (1967), alchemized the whimsical bohemian spirit of the "summer of love" and influenced generations of musicians with its sonic inventions and surreal lyrics. Music journalists have called him "the golden boy of the mind-melting late-60s psychedelic era, its brightest star and ultimately its most tragic victim" (2). In fact after two haunting solo albums, "The Madcap Laughs"
[history] and "Barrett," which showed the last flickering lights of his genius, his eccentric and creative personality drifted into a psychotic reclusive state, forcing him to withdraw from public view in 1974 (3–5). However, Pink Floyd would pay tribute to Barrett and would include madness as an ongoing theme on their best and most successful albums, "Dark Side of the Moon" (1973) and "The Wall" (1979), speaking to Syd directly in the songs "Wish You Were Here" and "Shine on You Crazy Diamond."

Barrett spent the rest of his life in his mother’s house in Cambridge, painting and gardening.
A 40th anniversary release of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn is to be released next month.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

okay, no bad 80's mix tape for you.

Dr. Rob said...

You got me humming Pink Floyd now. My favorite lines from "Wish You Were Here" are:

"Now there's a look in your eyes like black holes in the sky." (Regarding Syd in his catatonic state)
and
"We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl year after year."

Good post!

Rob

Unknown said...

How do I find my creative genius? What if all I am is mediocre?

Steve said...

hey, nice musings. keep it up, you never know who's reading :-)

Anonymous said...

Pink Floyd was the band of choice among all the juveniles at the treatment center.

Anonymous said...

Pink Floyd continues to be a band of choice among many talented young musicians and their teachers, not to mention parents.

James Morgan - Puritan Financial Advisor said...

I am similarly sure that modernizing the Medicare mental health benefit will reduce unnecessary spending. Medicare mental health expenses have historically been heavily skewed toward more expensive inpatient services, with 56 percent of the total going to inpatient care and only 30 percent toward outpatient services in 2001.