I just got news of Syd Barrett’s death from cancer at age 60. Barrett, in case you don’t know, fronted Pink Floyd in their early days.
Sometimes I feel like this blog needs an obits category. I’m at that age now where contemporary musicians and writers who influenced me in one way or another are beginning to die with some regularity (collectively, I mean. I don’t think an individual can “die with some regularity”). That’s probably a post in itself for another time.
Alas, I have little anymore to say about Barrett — I haven’t given him a thought (or listened to his music) in years. When I was a teenager learning to play rock bass, Barrett was a musical influence for his creative use of dissonance and effects (I was fascinated by psychedellic effects in music), and also a figure of intrigue, mostly for the reasons outlined in the Guardian obit. I always liked the bootlegged solo material better than the two released studio albums, and Piper at the Gates of Dawn most of all.