Syd Barrett Guitar Playing Legacy

Syd Barrett Guitar

It is my belief that Syd Barrett's initial rise to fame, and lasting contribution to music, was through his innovative and technically advanced guitar playing. While Hendrix was still wood shedding in NYC as an unknown, Syd was exploring inner-space with his guitar, EchoRec and slide rig. In my opinion, before this, guitar playing was relegated to playing-the-notes. With the guitar, EchoRec and slide introduced by Syd, no longer was the guitar constrained by mere "notes"; it had been turned into a sound synthesization device.

Syd Barrett Guitar

The signature Pink Floyd Song at the time, and for years afterward, was Interstellar Overdrive. Wikipedia says Interstellar Overdrive was one of very first psychedelic instrumental improvisations recorded by a rock band. It also set the tone of Pink Floyd as a "space rock" band. This song, and Astronomy Domine, gave Barrett the full room to "freakout" with his guitar rig. I find it odd that people are quoted as saying Syd was a very "innovative" guitar player but not a very "technical" one. In my opinion, Syd sits at the apex of technical ability, at the time, with his revolutionary guitar rig and grasp on how to effectively use it. 

Syd Barrett Guitar

Then came the novelty song - Arnold Layne which became a hit. Next was See Emily Play which sports one of Syd's most amazing guitar breaks on recording. After that was the breakdown; whether is be from an LSD overdose or mental illness is not going to be examined here. After the breakdown, Syd's guitar playing changed. Gone were the flights of inner space fancy to be replaced by a more primitive, and crunchy, chord playing.

Syd Barrett Guitar

For the 1969 "comeback", I think that it was a matter of trying to make something out of the shattered remains of the career. They got him to hammer out songs that he had on an acoustic and then brought in musicians to fill in music around it. They scoured old notebooks and had him record "new" bits of song from them Oddly enough, they chose to ignore the complete songs from 1968 that were in the can. But none of these songs on the solo albums focused on Syd Barrett the Electric Guitar God. In fact, much of the guitar work on these albums is by David Gilmour.

Syd Barrett Guitar

From 1970 - 1972, it was attempted to get him playing live again. The few recordings from these attempts reveal that his guitar playing had deteriorated badly. There was no innovative use of the  guitar, EchoRec and slide rig. This was replaced by a very primitive, and heavy, chord-type playing. On the Last Put Together Boogie Band recording, it is my belief that much of the playing attributed to Syd is actually Fred Frith. On the few parts that I am pretty sure it is Syd, it sounds like he is monkeying around with the guitar playing sounds that have zero to do with the music being played by the band at hand. It's as if he had lost control of being able to integrate the sounds into some form of music.

Syd Barrett Guitar

I think this is the primary reason that he withdrew from the public; his mental illness made it impossible for him to summon the concentration needed to play the guitar like he was known for doing. Also, the desire to do so seems to have left him. Those are two huge hurdles to overcome; not being able to coupled with not even wanting to anymore.

Syd Barrett Guitar

Had Syd not gotten ill? I think things would have been very different. He was already beginning to experiment with two EchoRecs hooked into each other. This would have expanded his palate of sounds exponentially. More guitar devices and tricks were just over the horizon. For sure, I think that a young Robert Fripp was paying close attention to Syd Barrett guitar playing.

Five Man Pink Floyd

Five Man Pink Floyd

Everybody is familiar with Syd Barrett's descent into madness and departure from Pink Floyd. This post focuses on the brief time that he was still in the band with David Gilmour. The Five Man Pink Floyd couldn't continue because Syd was so ill and we were not worthy.
Coming back from a disastrous American tour, Pink Floyd embarked on an almost equally disastrous package tour with the Jimi Hendrix Experience. It was the last straw for poor Syd. There is a photo of him sitting dejected right behind the amps while Jimi Hendrix makes music history on the stage.
Syd's last gig, as the leader of Pink Floyd, was at an event called Christmas on Earth. It was an attempt to re-create the vibe of the 14 Hour Technicolour Dream earlier that spring. 

Five Man Pink Floyd

Here is an account of that from June Bolan: "The last gig Syd played was at the Christmas on Earth gig. We found Syd in the dressing room and he was so....gone. Roger waters and I got him to his feet and onto the stage. He had a white Stratocaster and we put it around his neck and he walked onstage. The band started to play and Syd just stood there. He had his guitar around his neck and his arms just hanging down and I was in the wings wondering what to do. Suddenly he put his hands on the guitar and we thought, 'Great, he's actually going to do it!' But he just stood there, he just stood there tripping out of his mind.”
Andrew King says about the same night: "There was little communication between Syd and the rest of the band. It’s hard to manage a band in that state. Could you have a conversation with him? Yeah, he seemed withdrawn but a lot of the time he was fine. The band – everyone – felt, how can we go on like this? I’m sure Syd did too. Unreliability was an element but there was more to it. They were totally directionless. I don’t think they’ve ever played worse. The rest of the band just gritted their teeth, stood there for an hour and sort of played their instruments."

Five Man Pink Floyd

He continues: "The organisers just got the event wrong. There was no reason why it shouldn’t have sold out. It was too much of an imitation of the 14-Hour Technicolour Dream and events like that. There had been too many of them. Every time you opened Melody Maker, there were adverts for this Happening and that Freakout. It got like that with raves and dance music in the last few years. Some of them did well and some went down the tubes.”
It was at this gig that Nick Mason approached David Gilmour and asked him if he would be interested in joining the band. Nick said things were getting "pretty desperate".
Shortly after that, the phone rang,  “I would be the front-man, on stage, “ Gilmour says in a DVD. “But it wasn’t really workable. The notion passed by very quickly. In fact, I think there were only five gigs, as I remember it, where there was the five of us played together. Then we ceased to go pick him up.”
Check out an interview with Gilmour about that here:


“I was 21, and one is fairly ambitious,” Gilmour says in an unedited bonus interview on the Pink Floyd and Syd Barrett Story DVD.
“You want to get on with stuff. That sort of offer is a very hard one to turn down. And, logically speaking, it wasn’t working. Syd was not performing at all on stage. It was kind of tragic.
"I don’t suppose I saw any option, but to just do the best that I could. I’m sure we were all full of some sort of guilt, and remained that way for a long time.”
Gilmour was incorporated into the band during three days of rehearsals in a West London school hall in January 1968. This was where Syd attempted to teach the band a new song called Have You Got It Yet? Each time the song reached the chorus, Syd would change the song, so the band could never get it. As a piece of performance art or comedy, it was rather clever.
"It was an open page," Gilmour says. "My initial ambition was just to get the band into some sort of shape. It seems ridiculous now, but I thought the band was awfully bad at the time when I joined. The gigs I'd seen with Syd were incredibly undisciplined. The leader figure was falling apart, and so was the band."
The band’s first performance as a five-piece was Aston University, on January 12th. It appears that Syd knew what was up and didn't like it. Barrett went and stood onstage right in front of Gilmour, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they were in the middle of playing a show. Syd then began walking around Gilmour, his childhood friend, like a panther, “as if checking that Dave was a three dimensional object” in the words of Floyd roadie Iain “Emo” Moore, checking “that he was real. It was as if Syd was thinking: Am I dreaming this?”
"There were jolly moments," Gilmour said in the Barrett biography. "Two or three of us in a row including Syd, doing a jig in a dressing room before going on stage."
Gilmour says, "It was tragic, really. There were five gigs we did together. We've got a bit of film of Syd in a dressing room somewhere at one of those gigs, and he dances this little jig, a little dance, and he's all smiling and laughing. But you look at him and go: 'Oh God, no, tragic.' Poor chap. I can't remember much about it. I was brand new and I think they knew I'd be taking over."
Following that, they played

• Weston Super Mare 13 Jan
• Lewes Sussex 19 Jan
• Hastings Sussex 20 Jan

Five Man Pink Floyd

The Lewes' gig has some documentation about it. The concert was staged as a fund-raiser for Lewes Football Club with the profits going towards buying the first-ever floodlights at The Dripping Pan. Music enthusiast Norman Ashdown, who was on the club’s management committee, thought bringing big name bands to Lewes would make money. As well as thinking up the idea, he did all the legwork, from booking the groups and the Town Hall to organizing the publicity and bar. Pink Floyd were not actually Norman’s first choice. He first tried for Jimi Hendrix but found the £700 asking price too high. Instead he got Floyd for £500.
Norman’s son Mark was seventeen in 1968. “Because my dad was the Promoter, I remember being allowed backstage in the dressing rooms. I got to sit next to Rick Wright on his keyboards but all I could manage to play was chopsticks. They were a really nice bunch of guys”.
To around five hundred people, the band played two forty-five minute sets including tracks from "Piper at the Gates of Dawn”. The set included “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun”, “Flaming” and “Interstellar Overdrive”. And when the band started “Careful with that axe Eugene” (probably Pow Toc H) everyone was asked to sit down on the floor and watch the light show. “It was amazing.” remembers Mark “Almost like meditation.”

Five Man Pink Floyd

After the Hastings show, the next show, at Southampton University on January 26th, was the one Syd was not picked up for. According to Gilmour in a 1995 interview with Guitar World, "One person in the car said, 'Shall we pick Syd up?' and another person said, 'Let’s not bother.'” However, they neglected to tell Syd his services were no longer needed in the band he created. The gig went so well, they didn’t call for him the next night either.
There was one gig on that UK tour however when Barrett did turn up, according to roadie Emo. He was already there when the band set up the gear onstage. Barrett sat at the side, waiting for the show to begin. It wasn’t until Floyd took the stage without him that it sunk in that there was someone else playing his part.

Five Man Pink Floyd

The 1968 album A Saucerful of Secrets was the last collaborative effort between all five members and the recording only featured one wholly self-composed track by Barrett. According to an interview with Gilmour on the 2006 documentary Which One's Pink?, the studio version of the song contained minor guitar work both from Gilmour and Barrett, making "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" the only Pink Floyd song that features all five band members, though some listeners may not fully discern the guitar tracks as Gilmour's guitar is played through an amplifier that makes it blend in with Richard Wright's keyboards and organs, and Barrett's guitar effects first sound like groaning, then seagulls.
Much later, asked about leaving Pink Floyd, Syd said, "It wasn't really a war. I suppose it was really just a matter of being a little offhand about things. We didn't feel there was one thing which was gonna make the decision at the minute. I mean, we did split up, and there was a lot of trouble. I don't 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. Still..."
June Bolan said later, "I think it's indicative of 'fame'-it could be just one record, something like 'See Emily Play,' and your first 'Top of the Pops'-and then things change," she says. "Before, they were four people who'd grown up together, or gone to college together. It became separate camps of people: your smokers and dopers, and your drinkers."
And  affirms, "Once Syd lost his grip, they were really wicked to him. With Syd behaving like a complete cretin, they would send him up on long car journeys where you're all stuck in one vehicle, and there's nowhere to go because you've got to end up at the gig. Perhaps had they been kinder, in those early days of his breakdown or cracking up or whatever you want to call it, he may not have been hit so hard by it all. But that is speculation. It may have happened anyway, in exactly the same way, or it may not have happened so badly-but I do feel that they were horrider to him than they need to have been."

Syd Barrett Concert Recollection: 1967-11-25 Blackpool Opera House (early show)

Syd Barrett Concert Recollection: 1967-11-25 Blackpool Opera House (early show) by Simon Phillips

Syd Barrett Concert

I was 15 in 1967 and very much into the Beatles and the Yardbirds. Living in Lancashire, I had no access to anything that was happening in 'Swinging London'. There was no internet (of course) so we relied on pirate radio and the weekly music papers for our news. I think I heard Arnold Layne on the radio pretty much around the same time I first read of Pink Floyd. I liked it immediately - firstly it was pretty 'catchy'; and secondly it seemed like a progression from what the Yardbirds were doing.
At around the same time, they appeared on TV twice within about a week. I missed their first appearance (Scene Special?) but my friends at school were talking about it. I was annoyed to have missed it but tuned in over the next few nights and, sure enough, they were on again (I don't recall what this would have been).

Syd Barrett Concert

The music press continued to run articles on them over the following months and I duly bought Emily (which I loved) and Piper. I still recall playing Piper for the first time on the day of its release - the music was far beyond anything I was expecting or had even heard at that time, and I played Interstellar Overdrive over and over, following each instrument as best I could. This is still my favourite version. I missed their Top Of The Pops 'Emily' appearances as we were on a family trip to Italy at the time.

Syd Barrett Concert

When the Hendrix/Move/Floyd tour was announced, they were coming to Blackpool, 15 miles from where I lived. Tickets were (if I remember correctly) 4 shillings and 6 pence (which is 22.5 pence, or 1/5th of a £, in current money).  My parents were OK with me going with a couple of friends so long as it was to the early show (thankfully, as it turned out, from the Hendrix point of view). The bus journey was about an hour.
We got to the Opera House around 6pm. It was an old Victorian theatre, with Stalls, a Circle (which curved round to where one might usually find boxes towards side-stage) and an Upper Circle. We were in the centre stalls, about 12-18 rows back from the stage. The stage itself was a bit of a mess  with the equipment of several bands all set up - drums and amplifiers, loads of them, in two rows.

Syd Barrett Concert

When the show started, the venue was still only about half full and the compere invited those in the Upper Circle to come down into the stalls, presumably a) so they could turn off the heating upstairs, and b) to make the place look fuller (imagine…this was Hendrix and the Floyd playing for peanuts!!!!!)

Syd Barrett Concert

As I recall, the bottom-of-the-bill acts got about 5-10 minutes each. I think The Nice did maybe three numbers (one of which was 'America'). Just before Pink Floyd came on, a huge long white sheet was draped across the rows of amplifiers. The compere (Pete Drummond?) introduced them as being “fresh from wooing the hippie emporiums on America’s West Coast”). They came on in darkness and did about 20 minutes.
They wore exactly the same clothes as they do in the photographs of them cutting a cake and drinking champagne, except that Syd wore the hat that Nick has on in the photographs. I know this because I saw the photograph only a short time later in one of the music papers and the show was still very fresh in my mind. They definitely did Set The Controls and Interstellar Overdrive.

Syd Barrett Concert

I kept a scrapbook of news cuttings at the time and remember writing down Stethoscope as being the other song but, with hindsight, it was more likely to have been Pow R Toch H (I was still a bit unsure about some of the album’s song titles and often got those two mixed up). [All set lists that I’ve seen for this date have the early and late shows the wrong way round].
We (or, at any rate, I) had no idea of Syd’s struggles at the time and I can say that, at that show, it was definitely him and he seemed in good form as he and Rick led the band through a dazzling Interstellar Overdrive. I can still close my eyes and picture him, 20-30 feet away, hat on, head down over his guitar (which I picture as being his mirrored Esquire.... I may be wrong).

Syd Barrett Concert

The light show was of the liquid oil type played onto the band and onto the white sheet behind them. They also had a strobe low down at the front which projected their silhouettes high up onto the backdrop of the stage (the stage curtains in the Hendrix footage from the show weren’t closed at all other than for Hendrix).
The sound was loud but clear and each instrument could be distinguished. The combination of light and sound was exactly what I hoped it would be from the reviews I'd read of their London shows. I was mesmerised but all too soon it was over.
Afterwards, the Move did about 20 minutes at deafening volume, and then Hendrix did about 50 minutes. Just before he came on, they closed the stage curtains thus blocking out all the other amplifiers on stage. We'd seen a camera up in the right-hand side of the Circle. There was now someone filming him (no, the camera was definitely not used during the Floyd's set) and two of the songs are now up on Youtube. The following week, I read in the local paper that, playing to a half-full house in the late show, Hendrix said “this ain’t my scene, man” and walked off stage after 10 minutes.
After the show, we had about an hour to kill before our bus home. We slipped into a pub for one pint (very nervously as we were under-age) and then walked along the promenade. We saw a very dirty and dusty Ford Transit van parked up outside a club. It was covered in graffiti written in the dust, amongst which were references to Pink Floyd so we looked in the cab and, wow, Rick Wright was sitting behind the wheel in his stage gear.

Syd Barrett Concert

We tapped on the window and said we’d been to the show. We all got his autograph and asked where Syd was. He pointed into the club (no way we could blag our way in there). We chatted to him for a couple of minutes and went for our bus. And that was it really. I was so shocked when, a few weeks/months later, it was announced that Syd was out of the band.

Did Roger and David Sabotage Madcaps Laughs?

Listening to Madcap Laughs, I always used to cringe when Lone Gone, leading into the Breakdown Sequence came on. That's most of the second part of the album. Before Opel came out the Jenner tracks were heavily bootlegged. I used to think: "Why didn't *they* include these, far superior, tracks on the album?

Then I started the famous Laughing Madcaps group years ago I began hearing people post about Gilmour and Waters "sabotaging" Syd's effort. Think about it, Pink Floyd was hardly a household name back then and they had been mired in doing soundtrack work and were further mired in making that, love it or hate it, opus of excess, Ummagumma. I'll tell you this, because I remember, Ummagumma ended up RIGHT in the "cut out" bin when it came out.
I maintain that in the immediate years after Syd was ousted from his own band that he was a much superior creative force to "Pink Floyd". This means that he was writing and recording better songs than them.

I think that the Peter Jenner produced tracks from 1968 are waaaaaaaay better than any of the non-Syd stuff from Saucerful or that hodge-podge LP More. Some of that non-Syd stuff on Saucerful is pretty hard on the ears while More sounds like them farting around in the studio. Some of the tracks are pretty weak too like that drumming track. I wonder whose idea it was to put a tribal drumming track onto the album? Somebody who might have heard Rhamadan? The tracks are waaaaay too similar.
Then we get to that turd of an album called Ummagumma. The first disc is nothing but live Syd covers; them milking the previous era for all it was worth. The second disc is pretty fucking weak.
To compare this weak studio shit from what Syd was doing in the studio for Madcaps Laughs is to compare a yearling stallion to a worn out old plow horse. The Madcap stuff is miles and miles and miles better than the Ummashitta stuff!

Here's mad Syd writing these fantastic songs and acting like he could give a fuck. What better way to "make sure" that his solo effort doesn't eclipse the band's? Put the Breakdown Sequence in! And both Gilmour and Waters stating that they did it to show the "truth" of Syd's condition and "show how it was" making the album lend credence to that theory. WHO does such a thing when making an album? One wants to put out THE BEST effort, the BEST STUFF. So, by their own admission, Waters and Gilmour DID sabotage Madcap Laughs.
You know what? I think Pink Floyd knew it too! That's why Waters wanted to "help" with the mix and ignored monumental finished tracks, right at the mixing console, to hastily record and release demoish sounding tracks that hurt Syd's image. Maybe that's why Syd hated Waters so. He ruined his album and cemented his image as a crazy fuck up.

What did Pink Floyd have at this time that was better than Syd? organization. Pink Floyd had organization. They were more organized. Syd didn't help his cause by walking away from Peter Jenner in 1968. He didn't help his cause in the recording of Madcap. He didn't take things seriously. Pink Floyd, with their superior organization, did.
But all factors taken into account, Syd was outperforming and out-producing Pink Floyd in 1968 - 1969. So Waters needed to throw a monkey wrench into things. But Syd could have prevented that by being more organized.
If Madcap Laughs had come out with the below revisions, I think that it would have been much better received.
Replace: She Took a Long Cold Look 1:55 Feel 2:17 If It's in You 2:26
with: Opel 6:26 Swan Lee (Silas Lang) 3:13 And if one wanted to make the album even stronger, replace: Long Gone 2:50 with: Lanky (part 1) 5:32
So, the revised Madcap Laughs tracklist would be: 1. Terrapin 2. No Good Trying 3. Love You 4. No Man's Land 5. Dark Globe 6. Here I Go 7. Octopus 8. Golden Hair 9. Opel 10. Swan Lee 11. Lanky (part 1) 12. Late Night
Tracklist of what came out: 1. Terrapin 2. No Good Trying 3. Love You 4. No Man's Land 5. Dark Globe 6. Here I Go 7. Octopus 8. Golden Hair 9. Long Gone 10. She Took a Long Cold Look 11. Feel 12. If it's In You 13. Late Night
Find a link to a Revised Madcap Laughs Spotify playlist HERE.

Roger Waters Israel - Syd Barrett Blog Denounces Waters

Roger Waters Israel

The Syd Barrett Pink Floyd Blog denounces former Pink Floyd Member, Roger Waters', stand on Israel as inaccurate and anti-Semitic. In as short and simple terms as possible, below is our explanation.
First, the Jewish people require a Homeland. As guest citizens of the many countries where they have lived, they have always greatly contributed to the culture, economy and way of life where they have been citizens. Still, this always hasn't worked out well for them and the Jewish people have been the victims of well-documented persecution throughout the ages.
Comparatively recently, they endured the Holocaust, or Shoah, where Nazi Germany instituted industrial murder of people that they deemed "unworthy". In all, twelve million people were killed including six million Jews, representing most of Europe's Jews and two-thirds of the Jewish population of the world. After years of wholesale murder of their people in Europe, the Jewish people could not continue as "guest citizens" anywhere anymore.

Roger Waters Israel

Little by little, survivors of shattered families moved to their spiritual Homeland, Palestine. By 1949, there were enough Jews in Palestine to affect change and form a government. There is a lot of talk today from some that the Jews "stole" the land from the "Palestinians". It should be known that there were no "Palestinians" in 1949. There were Bedouins who roamed the desert. There was no government; Palestine was overseen by the British.
There had been Jews living in Palestine since Biblical times. Many of these sold, or donated, their land to the creation of a Jewish State. There were Arab land owners who were eager to sell, what was considered wasteland, to the effort for the creation of a Jewish State. The British, eager to leave Palestine after Word War II, allocated land to the creation of a Jewish State after a brief armed struggle. Ultimately, the United Nations stepped in a created a Resolution, taking all of the purchased, donated and allocated land, created the Jewish State - Israel. The surrounding Arab countries, the British, the Jews AND the Bedouins (Palestinians) all agreed to UN Resolution.

Roger Waters Israel

Shortly after the agreement of the leaders of all parties concerned, and the UN Resolution, the group that became known as "the Palestinians" pulled out their support. This began the decades long struggle by the Palestinians dedicated to the destruction of the State of Israel. This struggle has been, almost always, expressed with terrorist actions.
In addition to the terrorist activities, there have been several wars including two where all of the Arab countries surrounding Israel attacked and made bold proclamations to "drive the Jews into the sea". In all these wars Israel was victorious and did seize some land. Much of this land was given back, in an effort to secure peace, a small part of the land has been occupied for security purposes. In many of the peace agreements with the surrounding Arab countries, the Arab proponents for peace with Israel were ultimately assassinated by radical elements of their own population.
Recently, there has been another "Land for Peace" deal where Israel gave back land to the Palestinians in return for solemn vows of "peace forever". This land was for a Palestinian Homeland. This hasn't worked out well for Israel. In Gaza, one of the "Land for Peace" areas, in their first democratic elections, the Palestinians threw out the moderates and elected the radical terrorist group Hamas as their "government". This began the years of using the land, given for peace, as a staging area for terrorist attacks and fire rockets into Israel.

Roger Waters Israel

In 2005, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (and referred to in this post as BDS) was started. Terrorism hadn't been effective for the Palestinians; Israel was stronger than ever. Taking a note from South Africa's anti-apartheid movement, BDS seeks to compare the situation in Israel to South Africa under apartheid. BDS actually disinclines further negotiation between Palestine organizations and Israel while simultaneously hearkening back to anti-Semitic boycotts of Jewish businesses while seeking to de-legitimize Israel. 
Roger Waters is a very vocal supporter of BDS. He has used his fame as a platform to shine a favorable light on BDS while talking about Israel, and the Jewish people, in derogatory and sometimes disgusting ways. To date, Roger Waters has called for a boycott of Israel and has even spoken before the United Nations on behalf of BDS. He has put the Star of David on the rear end of his inflatable pig that he flies at concerts. The Star of David is the primary symbol of Judaism and also appears on Israel’s flag. The "pig" can also be seen as derogatory because the Jewish religion refutes the eating of swine. It can even be said that the placement of the Star of David, on the pig's ass, is deliberate.

Roger Waters Israel

In a supreme act of (at the very least) callousness, Roger Waters has repeatedly compared Israel to Germany under the Nazis. To the Jewish people this is, quite understandably, the ultimate insult. Almost all of the Jewish people today have family members who died in the Holocaust; many had entire branches of their families wiped out. The writer of this blog post used to work with a man whose father was the sole surviving member of both sides of his family. To compare Israel to the Nazis is beyond inflammatory and is likening them to the murderers of their people.
It is an absurd comparison too, Arabs and Jews live in the same neighborhoods in Israel and mix freely at the same stores, restaurants, movie theaters and hospitals. Most importantly, there are no government pogroms to round up and systematically murder the Arab population.
The idea that Israel is an apartheid state is a staple of Waters' (and BDS') argument. The comparison to apartheid South Africa is absurd as well. In apartheid South Africa, it controlled every aspect of life there; the school one attended, the work one did, where people lived, hospitals and ambulances were segregated, interracial marriage was forbidden. One could even face arrest for sitting on the wrong park bench.
More than twenty-percent of Israelis are Arab and have full voting rights. Arabs are found in Israel's military and diplomatic corps. Seventeen members of the Israeli Knesset (the Parliament) are Arab as well as one member of the country's Supreme Court. In Israeli hospitals and clinics, Jewish and Arab physicians and nurses work together to provide care equally to all patients. BDS is not stupid, for them to propagate this comparison under "human rights" is both cynical and manipulative. Waters, announces that Israel is an "apartheid state" constantly and ceaselessly but that doesn't make it true; it makes Waters (at the very least) ill-informed.

Roger Waters Israel

Roger Waters has made a public spectacle of writing "open" letters to artists and performers scheduled to appear in Israel urging them to back out of their commitment. Most recently, he has gotten into a public skirmish with the British rock group Radiohead. It should be noted that the number of artists and performers who support Israel far outweigh those few who don't. Currently Radiohead, Nick Cave, Fatboy Slim, Robbie Williams, Duran Duran, Tears for Fears, Rod Stewart and The Pixies have confirmed gigs in Israel.
He has commented that other musicians are afraid of the "control" of the Jews in the US.  His life's mission is boycotting Israel, but when people try to return the favor and boycott him he then goes into the classic anti-Semitic rant about how the Jews are trying to control everyone.

Roger Waters Israel

Roger Waters has accused Israel of being the worst regime in the world.  He falsely accuses Israel of attempted genocide and slaughter.  He refuses to acknowledge other countries that are literally gassing their own citizens.  He refuses to acknowledge atrocities in the world.  Instead he focuses solely and falsely on Israel. It is noteworthy that while he claims that he is not an anti-Semite, and that he only has a problem with Israel, has made a number of anti-Semitic comments.
This writer finds it odd that Waters' father died fighting Fascism and yet he is anti-Israel himself. The destruction of the Jewish people was one of the supreme tenants to the Nazi regime and the State of Israel is living proof of the defeat of Fascism in World War II. This writer's own father fought in WWII (Japanese) and returned home with (undiagnosed) PTSD that affected him for the rest of his life.
This writer heard tales from his Aunts about his Father the avid hunter and hell raiser around town. That's not the man this writer knew. This writer's father was a pacifist who hated guns and violence. He spent a lot of time in his room, didn't like large crowds, couldn't be woken from sleep without screaming.
This writer's dad wholly supported Israel, as did his mother, and they educated this writer about why that support was so important. This writer's parents also educated him about the destruction of the Jewish people at the hands of the Nazis, the need for a Jewish State and that Israel is the living proof of the defeat of the Nazis. To this writer, it's odd that Waters' own father died, fighting the same fight against Fascism, and Waters seems to "deny" something so fundamental about Israel, the Jewish State.

Roger Waters Israel

Finally, this writer asks Roger Waters to imagine a line separating the supporters of Israel and the detractors of Israel. Waters should take a look on "his" side of the line and see what company he's keeping. Other of Israel's detractors are "fine" civics organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, the American Nazi Party and the Aryan Nation. One will also find "peaceful and democratic" countries like Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Pakistan and more. Roger Waters will see "upstanding citizens" such as David Duke, American Nazi Leader - Matt Koehl, skinheads, racist and others. Waters should look at the company he's keeping in his quest; they are all cheering him on.
It is this writer's opinion that Roger Waters is, sadly, the dupe of the latest ploy by the Palestinians to take down Israel; the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement. He uses his cultural platform to advance a movement whose own stated ultimate goal is the destruction of the Jewish State. He also uses his support of BDS as a "cloak" while he expresses his own vile and hateful views.
Therefore, this Syd Barrett Pink Floyd blog denounces Roger Waters. Waters is trying to actively "undo" one of the key outcomes, in the defeat of Fascism, of World War II. He is disrespecting the ultimate sacrifice of his own father. Finally, this writer hates that Waters politicized Pink Floyd in this way; it's like smearing a picture of a beautiful sunset with feces.

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond 1993 Press Release

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond press releases. Check out these EMI Records press release sheets for Crazy Diamond - The Complete Syd Barrett. The first is dated April 14 1993 and is for the release of the 3CD Box Set. The second is dated April 19 1994 and is for the release of the 3 CDs with bonus tracks, which were originally only available with the 3CD Box Set released the year. Both sheets are in very good to excellent condition. 

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond

This is a 1993 release and out of print in the U.S., and is the Syd's 1993 box set on EMI. Features both of his 1970 solo albums, 'Barrett' & 'The Madcap Laughs', plus the 1989 rarities compilation 'Opel' with 6 additional tracks added to it; 58 tracks total. Came in a 6' x 12' long-box that also contained a 24 page booklet.
Disc: 1   1. Terrapin   2. No Good Trying   3. Love You   4. No Man's Land   5. Dark Globe   6. Here I Go   7. Octopus   8. Golden Hair   9. Long Gone   10. She Took A Long Cold Look   11. Feel   12. If It's In You   13. Late Night   14. Octopus (Takes 1 & 2)   15. It's No Good Trying (Take 5)   16. Love You (Take 1)   17. Love You (Take 3)   18. She Took A Long Cold Look At Me (Take 4)   19. Golden Hair (Take 5)

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond

Disc: 2   1. Baby Lemonade   2. Love Song   3. Dominoes   4. It Is Obvious   5. Rats   6. Maisie   7. Gigolo Aunt   8. Waving My Arms In The Air   9. I Never Lied To You   10. Wined And Dined   11. Wolfpack   12. Effervescing Elephant   13. Baby Lemonade (Take 1)   14. Waving My Arms In The Air (Take 1)   15. I Never Lied To You (Take 1)   16. Love Song (Take 1)   17. Dominoes (Take 1)   18. Dominoes (Take 2)   19. It's Obvious (Take 2)

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond

Disc: 3   1. Opel   2. Clowns & Jugglers   3. Rats   4. Golden Hair   5. Dolly Rocker   6. Word Song   7. Wined And Dined   8. Swan Lee (Silas Lang)   9. Birdie Hop   10. Let's Split   11. Lanky (Part 1)   12. Wouldn't You Miss Me (Dark Globe)   13. Milky Way   14. Golden Hair   15. Gigolo Aunt (Take 9)   16. It Is Obvious (Take 3)   17. It Is Obvious (Take 5)   18. Clowns & Jugglers (Take 1)   19. Late Night (Take 2)   20. Effervescing Elephant (Take 2)

Syd Barrett Crazy Diamond