Remembering Psychedelic Rock Legend Syd Barrett on His Birthday

Today we remember Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett, co-founder and former member of Pink Floyd, who would have been 77 years old today. 

Source: The Pink Floyd HyperBase/Aubrey Powell

As a musician, Barrett was a rather innovative guitarist before the peak of his decline, known for mixing slide guitar with echo using a lighter and delay pedal to create a lot of the sounds present in Pink Floyd's music. In the same vein, he loved exploring different effects, and playing around with distortion, feedback, and dissonance as well. As a vocalist, he sang with a heavy southern English accent, and was often cited as one of the first to do so in rock music. Many artists, such as Paul McCartney, Marc Bolan, the Flaming Lips, David Bowie, have all cited him as an influence on their work. 

Barrett was active as a musician for nine years, from 1963 to 1974 before disappearing from the public eye permanently. According to his sister, Rosemary Breen, he dedicated himself to painting and took an interest in photography and horticulture. He was also known to be an avid gardener. 

After a long battle with various health issues, he passed away on July 7, 2006 due to pancreatic cancer in his home located in Cambridge, England. He was 60 years old at the time of his death.

Today's a great day for some early Pink Floyd, or "Shine on You Crazy Diamond". Happy birthday, Syd.

Happy listening. 

Hey there! I'm Olive, and I'm a part-time blog writer hoping to share my love of older music and countercultural history. I started this blog during my freshman year of college as a means to get a head start doing what I love most - writing. I've always loved writing and music, and wanted to do something that would involve doing both. Now, I've got this cool (totally not biased) blog page!

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