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Now June 5th 1975 would mark the day Pink Floyd would see their old bandmate and former
ringleader Syd Barett for the last time.
Barrett crashed the band’s recording session for their ninth album Wish you Were Here.
The band members were left both shocked and saddened by the encounter.
What happened?
Stay tuned to find out.
Syd Barrett, Pink Floyd’s co-founder and the creative driving force behind their debut
LP, 1967's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, didn’t leave on good terms with the band.
Initially described as joyful, friendly, and extroverted, he began to experience personality
changes becoming increasingly depressed and socially withdrawn.
His mental instability, his volatile on and off-stage behavior and crippling addiction
to psychedelic drugs made him a liability to the band.
Barrett had minimal involvement in the group’s second LP 1968's A Saucerful of Secrets but
he was ultimately replaced by the time the album was finished.
While the band wanted to keep him as a touring member it became impractical and he was soon
replaced by guitarist-singer David Gilmour Following his departure from Pink Floyd, Barrett
would end up releasing two studio albums both in 1970's titled The Madcap Laughs and Barrett.
The members of pink floyd were so guilt ridden with kicking Syd out of the band that they
contributed to both solo records with both albums being co-produced by David Gilmour
and featuring basist Roger Waters and keyboardist Richard Wright, respectively.
Following the release of The Madcap Laughs Barrett retreated from the spotlight.
Late keyboardist Richard Wright, reflected on those solo sessions with Syd Barrett revealing:
“Doing Syd’s record was interesting, but extremely difficult.
Dave [Gilmour] and Roger did the first one (The Madcap Laughs) and Dave and myself did
the second one.
But by then it was just trying to help Syd any way we could, rather than worrying about
getting the best guitar sound.
You could forget about that!
It was just going into the studio and trying to get him to sing.” he’d remember
Fast forward 5 years later and Pink Floyd were working on their ninth studio record
Wish You Were Here.
Two notable events occurred on June 5, 1970.
One event was David Gilmour was getting married and, the band was completing the final mix
on the song “Shine On You Crazy Diamond.” which was a tribute to Syd Barrett.
There was also a third notable event on this day and that’s when Pink floyd got an unexpected
visitor in the studio.
An overweight man sporting shaved eyebrows and head holding a plastic bag walked into
the studio.
David Gilmour thought the man was a worker from the record label EMI, while the other
members initially had no idea who he was.
Eventually they realized it was their former bandmate Syd Barrett.
And according to one report Barrett held a toothbrush and attempted to brush his teeth
by holding the brush still and jumping up and down.
In Mason's memoir of Pink Floyd, titled Inside Out, he recalled Barrett's conversation as
“not entirely sensible".[23] Storm Thorgerson who was an english graphic designer and video
director who worked with Pink Floyd was present in the studio and later reflected on Barrett's
presence: "Two or three people cried.
He sat round and talked for a bit but he wasn't really there."[24]
During their chat Andrew King who was Pink Floyd’s co-manager who was also present
asked Barrett how he gained so much weight and Barrett reportedly said he had a big refrigerator
in his kitchen and he had been eating lots of pork chops.
And during the same conversation Barrett offered his services to the band, but when he listened
to the mix of Shine On he didn’t seem to understand the song’s connection to his
tragic life.
Waters asked Barrett what he thought of the song, and he simply said he did not like it,
and walked out of the studio.
During the visit barrett would also join the guests at Gilmour's wedding reception in the
EMI canteen, but he would leave without saying goodbye.
This photograph snapped of barrett is from that very day.
. Most of the band members wouldn’t see Barrett again until his death in 2006.
And Rogers Waters would reveal to the Mirror Newspaper in 2008 he had one final encounter
with Barrett revealing “The last time I saw him was a couple of years after he turned
up at the Wish You Were Here sessions,” “I bumped into him inaBritish department
store named Harrods where he used to go to buy sweets, but we didn’t speak – he sort
of scuttled away.”
Waters made no further attempt to try and communicate his ex-bandmate.
Waters would reflect back on Syd’s contribution to the band in a 1975 interview saying “I’m
very sad about Syd, [though] I wasn’t for years, “For years, I suppose he was a threat
because of all that bollocks written about him and us.
Of course, he was very important and the band would never have started without him, because
he was writing all the material.
It couldn’t have happened without him, but on the other hand, it couldn’t have gone
on with him.
He may or may not be important in rock ‘n’ roll anthology terms, but he’s certainly
not nearly as important as people say in terms of Pink Floyd.
So, I think I was threatened by him.”
Barrett would end up dying of pancreatic cancer in 2006
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