A programme in the BBC Omnibus series tonight focused on Syd, and there is a review here..
The story finished in 1978 when Syd moved back to Cambridge and the family home. After that there is nothing.
I know that Syd did not want to contribute to the programme but, like the reviewer says, it would have been nice if we could have had a health update on a man who was thought to be losing his sight five years ago.
Not included in the link are two photographs. One was taken sometime in the 1960’s and features the Syd many of us will remember from that time.
The other (undated) photograph shows Syd on his bicycle shopping in Cambridge.
I’ve seen a few photos of Syd that claim to be rather recent, but it’s really hard to pinpoint any of the photos on a timeline (at least in my experience) of Syd the reclusive artist 1975, 1985, or 1995.
I’d like to hear something about him in the here and now as well. I’d also heard that he wasn’t in very good health, but that was in something I heard in a passing comment on the radio one evening.
Thanks for the link. I hadn’t thought about him in a while. I all of a sudden have an urge to dig my Opal CD out and put the ‘Word Song’ on perpetual repeat…
I’m not a Floyd/Barrett fan but a Cambridge poet-bookseller friend of mine, Peter Riley, says Barrett’s been collecting a lot of books on ornithology. There’s a fine short poem in tribute to Syd Barrett in Peter’s book Author (reprinted in his selected poems Passing Measures) in case anyone’s curious–I’ll quote a few lines–
Well, he’s alive. Whether he’s kicking is another matter. I recall Peter Green being wheeled out 3-4 years ago for a few gigs and an album, he seemed ‘relatively’ okay (damaged but compos mentis) which was good to see but his creative years were clearly some distance since.
I thought Syd was living with his mum but I don’t really know for sure. I just wish the guy well. Whoever he now is.
