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Finnforest View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Topic: Syd Barrett - new personal info 8/08
    Posted: August 21 2008 at 20:01
The only true source for factual information on Syd's final years, his sister Rosemary, has given another very rare interview and shared more personal family memories of her famous brother.   I love when she humanizes Syd and lets people know that despite his problems, he was loved, loved others, and had some enjoyment in his life. 

A good read.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2008/08/18/my-brother-the-crazy-diamond-115875-20702224/

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 21 2008 at 21:34
Great addition, Finn......good reading...Sad story!
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 21 2008 at 21:34
A story that never ceases to interest me. Thanks, Jimbo Thumbs%20Up
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 00:17
Interesting read.

I think it was your review of 'Piper...' that made me take a different look on the album. I consider it an excellent piece of music now. Syd was a visionary.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 11:06
Thanks guys!
 
Progbagel, thanks for sharing that.  Affirms for me the best reason to keep writing reviews, hopefully to turn somebody on to something. 
 
Re Piper, while you're not supposed to make such comments, I have to say that the people who give the album 1 and 2 stars just don't "get it."  You don't have to love Piper, you don't have to consider it a masterpiece or essential, but in my opinion any critic worth his pen will realize the importance of the album in context to '67 Britain, and more important understand how revolutionary the songs were.  Even the sweeter, more childlike ones had their flair below the surface.  For people to understand the importance of Pet Sounds, Pepper, or Days of Future Passed, but deny Barrett's album just doesn't wash. 

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 12:59

 

                           Here's my contribution to this interesting thread Finnforest:

                      http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=17113

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 15:41
Hey erik, I've read about every book written on Syd....cept that one!! Hard to find.  But it needs to be said that the opinions of the band and the band's scene (oft quoted in these books) are quite different from that of the family.  Syd's condition will always be a source of debate.

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 16:18
In my opinion the family where in the 'denial phase' about Syd, especially when I read in your post that his sister says "he has no dark side" while he had shown showed the same sociopathic behaviour after drugs-abuse as Jim Morrison Evil%20Smile , the facts are known in any of the books about Syd Barrett or early Pink Floyd. And in those days of the anti-psychiatry many psychiatrists refused to label psychiatric patients suffering from schizophrenia, simply because they didn't believe this was a genuine mental disease! Both Roger Waters as David Gilmour have said that they had the idea that there was more than drugs-abuse causing Syd his capricious behaviour and poor mental state because before his drugs abuse he already showed signs of a psychotic world, they named schizophrenia as a possible cause!
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 16:34

I know there are two sides to this issue, and after everything I've read I believe the family's accounts to be more reliable.  But like I said, to each his own opinion on Syd.  The family saw him all the time in his later life, and met with him and his doctors.  The band and the writers saw nothing of him after the early 70s.  When you repeat the same guesses over and over like the writers and band do, the public tends to believe it.  The family knew the real Roger. 


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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 16:51

OK but Roger Waters and David Gilmour have spent a lot of time with Syd from childhood to their time as professionals musicians and they are very capable and reliable to give comments about Syd his erratic behaviour, I take their words very serious and for me these words are more close to reality than the words of his sister but that's a subjective point of view I have to admit.

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:07
Not just hIs sister ( a nurse), also his BIL, his nephew, and the docs they took him to.  But point taken.  I'm not saying Syd was perfectly healthy.  I'm only saying some of the opinions are wildly overblown.  He was an eccentric who could manipulate people with ease.  I've actually read interviews during the time he was supposedly unable to communicate, where he is perfectly lucid.  He could play the interviewer if he wished.  And he did.  His behaviour while on drugs was over the top of course which fuels the stories, but remember he also liked to piss off Roger so I'm sure he did more than he had to. 

Erik I am only saying that the Barrett story is more complicated than the pronouncements made by the band and those selling mags.  There is another side to the story, based on everything I have read. 




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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:11

A very sad story indeed.  I have to agree with Erik though.  I'm not a doctor (only "the" doctor), but I dated one for six years (a psychiatrist no less) and his symptoms, as described by his sister, bear a striking resemblance to schizophrenia. 

I can understand your anger at me, but what did the horse I rode in on ever do to you?
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:19
They may, but he saw shrinks more than once and was not diagnosed as such as I recall.  But its possible.   

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:29
My final thought on the matter.  If you want the whole story on Syd, you have to take in all the info.  There is alot out there and many opinions to be sure.  You can't just believe one author, one old girlfriend, or one hyper-opinionated rock star.  Reading all of the material available and truly hearing the people closest to Barrett post-70s (his family) show things to be a little more complicated than what is often pronounced.  You will find things that challenge some commonly held beliefs.  He was a complicated person.  There are no convenient one-word answers about this eccentric guy, in my opinion. 

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:49
Originally posted by Finnforest Finnforest wrote:

My final thought on the matter.  If you want the whole story on Syd, you have to take in all the info.  There is alot out there and many opinions to be sure.  You can't just believe one author, one old girlfriend, or one hyper-opinionated rock star.  Reading all of the material available and truly hearing the people closest to Barrett post-70s (his family) show things to be a little more complicated than what is often pronounced.  You will find things that challenge some commonly held beliefs.  He was a complicated person.  There are no convenient one-word answers about this eccentric guy, in my opinion. 
 
Fair enough, and well said.  Even those with diagnosable mental illnesses are complicated people and labels do not necessarily do justice to the individual.  Clap
 
I still think he was schizophrenic though.  Wink
I can understand your anger at me, but what did the horse I rode in on ever do to you?
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: August 22 2008 at 17:57

 

                 Good thread, good discussion, thanks and goodbey Thumbs%20Up

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