Recommend a Syd book

[theEvermoreWalrus]

I'm more interested in facts about his life and/or stories, rather than just music.

[rememberaday]

Well I can't really help you here, at the most I can suggest some books.

But here's a piece of advice - books about rockstars, if not autobiographies, tend to be horrible exaggerated representations of the actual persons they were. Specially, if you take people like Syd, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison....they're not the people the media and biographers made them to be. As for Syd, most of the stories about him are either fake or unsupported by certain evidence. Or take, the common saying that Morrison was interested in nihilism- that's plain rubbish, the guy just had a different, more raw vision of seeing things, but it became branded as "rebellious". These rock stars have been always stereotyped, and if you really want to get closer to them (not physically because all have been snatched away from us ) and know them as the true human beings they were, then I would suggest to listen to their music and their interviews (not interviews about them) and, if you really want to read a story about them, read their autobiography (I'm afraid in this case it's not possible). That's the only thing these "stars" actually wanted - to be cleansed of all their hype and stereotypes, and be labelled as normal human beings, no matter how special they were.

But, if you still want to go ahead, then here are my suggestions :

1) Syd Barrett : A Very Irregular Head by Robert Chapman
2) Dark Globe by Julian Palacois (I found it to be an interesting read)
3) You could see the Syd Barrett Story documentary, it has inputs from other PF members, though it tends to romantacize him a bit - nevertherless, it is interesting.

Hope I helped.

[theEvermoreWalrus]

Hello, rememberaday. Thanks for taking the time to write that. I mostly agree with everything you wrote and though I'm not the biggest Syd fan, I do listen to his music pretty often. I certainly agree that his music is the best way of knowing him.

I've watched the documentary you listed about a year ago and enjoyed it, but I'm still aiming for a good book on Barrett. I am aware that lots of books are filled with tons of lies and exaggerations, but that's the reason I asked for a recommendation in the first place. I'm looking for the best one and the closest to the truth one there is.

Again, thanks for the suggestions. I'll be looking deeper into those two.

[theEvermoreWalrus]

Also, the main reason I'm not really interested in works about music is because I'm not a musician by any means. I do understand simple observations such as "X is playing a banjo there and Y a harpsichord" and like to read them but something like "X's octave jump to falsetto at the end of an verse is pre-empted by another shock four bars earlier: a plunge from the home key of G major onto an unstable B minot" means absolutely nothing to me. So, you can see where I stand.

[rememberaday]

Evermore, I think that's where you're making the mistake. I said "listen to the music" , not the notes or chord progressions or instruments or pitch or phasing or flanging or studio trickery. Music, art, poetry, these things are emotions, and are not technical at all - there is no formula in any of these things.

Another suggestion is to see the Hans Keller interview where Syd talks very impressively ( considering that he *should not have been talking but standing mute* ) and you understand that he's a very sensitive, thoughtful soul. Well, there aren't great books for such types of people - you've got to (and this the hard part) connect to them without media but rather with emotions, and then using this connections, judge the books that come out. Don't judge Syd with those books, judge those books using Syd. If you do that, you'll have no real problem with any kind of book.

You can also see the interviews of some fans of Syd such as Robyn Hitchock, Syd's friend Duggie Fields.

[Matz]

there aint no book about Gilmour is there?

[Keith Jordan]

there aint no book about Gilmour is there?

Who?

There's The Black Strat by Phil Taylor his road/guitar tech about his guitar but not about the player!