In high school and college it was trendy to debate who was the essence of Pink Floyd. Was it Nick Mason? He was the only constant member of the group, but he didn't do a whole lot of writing. Was it Dave Gilmour? Perhaps. The last two albums were only possible through his determination and his good nature kept the band together even during its most divisive periods, even though he didn't officially join until the second album. Or was it Roger Waters? No doubt he wrote the lion's share of the group's material and albums like "Animals", "The Wall" and "The Final Cut" are essentially his work from beginning to end. However he has a reputation for being a megalomaniac and effectively drove everyone from the group by 1983.
Go back in time to around 1968 and the answer would probably be "none of the above because it's all about Syd Barrett". At least that's what the group's management felt when they essential abandoned the group to support Syd's solo career. On paper it seems like a no-brainer. "The" Pink Floyd had been running in the same circles as the Beatles in 1967 and in many minds they were well on the way to being their musical successors in the heyday of psychedelia and swinging London, with their charismatic and wild front man. Syd wrote virtually the entire first album, all supporting singles, and handled most of the vocals. Compared to the other three (Mason, Waters and keyboard guru Richard Wright), he was the complete artist. Only Wright came anywhere close to matching him in the performance department, but his songwriting was minimal at best. Mason and Waters came from architectural backgrounds, and performance-wise, they can best be described as "adequate" for the job. The problem, of course, with everything under Syd's lead, was that, fueled by ample amounts of LSD, he was well on the path to debilitating mental illness.
With this in mind, "The Madcap Laughs" feels like a horribly exploitative album. Even in the earliest recording sessions from May 1968, Syd was clearly running off the rails. The number of producers, session players, and sessions involved in the torturous recording sessions was heading toward "Chinese Democracy" proportions, and yet the majority of the cuts that comprise "The Madcap Laughs" sounds like an insecure guy with his acoustic guitar. Wild and outgoing Syd Barrett, the vanguard of the psychedelic era, was gone.
The powers that be managed to squeeze one more complete album from Syd Barrett (the appropriately-titled "Barrett", also 1970). After that Syd careened from one failed venture to another before finally dropping out of sight after the abortive all-star band called Stars. He showed up during Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" recording sessions in 1975, but the bald, overweight Syd Barrett was in no condition to reunite with his old bandmates, and he simply wandered away, this time for good. By the time of his death in 2006 he was just another face in the crowd, but his 1960's alter-ego left a legion of admirers who still considered him to be the true face of Pink Floyd.
In my music library, the musical prowess of the mentally ill is on full display with a number of recordings from the likes of Ray Davies, Brian Wilson, Roky Erickson, Peter Green, Skip Spence (see previous post) and many more in lesser-known groups. Listening to their work is both saddening and enlightening all at once.
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