Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

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des Esseintes
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Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by des Esseintes »

They start talking about the album at about the 17 minute mark:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cN0R450zJVw
des Esseintes
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by des Esseintes »

I thought a Syd Barrett forum would be interested in hearing an EMI engineer talking about the sessions.
Clearly I got that wrong - apologies!
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by Wolfpack »

des Esseintes wrote:I thought a Syd Barrett forum would be interested in hearing an EMI engineer talking about the sessions.
Well, I am!
Thanks for sharing! [-D-]

It's a chat of Andy Partridge with engineer John Leckie.
The Barrett part begins at 16:19.
It's about 'Barrett' (album),
mixing 'Vegetable Man' (in the 1970s)
and the unfinished 3rd solo album.

Leckie mentions Barrett doing drums for the 3rd album.
I've never heard anything with drums from those sessions.
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by Phantom Turnip »

Wolfpack wrote:Leckie mentions Barrett doing drums for the 3rd album.
I've never heard anything with drums from those sessions.
Maybe he just wasn't very good at them? :lol:
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by vizor »

des Esseintes wrote:I thought a Syd Barrett forum would be interested in hearing an EMI engineer talking about the sessions.
Yes, this is valuable first-hand information that of course, leaves a lot of questions. But as he was there working with him, he was witnessing the onset of his illness without knowing it. This account lacks most of the sensationalism that others closer to him have enjoyed for decades, even making careers out of the stories.

A result in all this has now been uncovered: Vegetable Man was a Barrett recording that had nothing to do with Pink Floyd, and the demand by fans has always been that Pink Floyd make available their unreleased recordings of Scream Thy Last Scream and Vegetable Man, all in the same breath. Please be aware of the following disclaimer: I am not a scholar of this muzac in any way. There may be writings clarifying the origins of Vegetable Man made in published books since I've taken an interest in this area, and have not ingested with the faithfulness of those that thrive on the subject.

Know that Part 5 also makes a blip of mention of the Barrett Sessions. A professional should interview and record this engineer again, and a number of times.

Lastly, this interview will likely be buried and hard-to-find as the seasons go by. Perhaps on this forum, a place could be made where such valuable media could be more readily gone through. This has been a rare find, as occasionally something does come to surface that tells a more interesting truth.
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by jtull »

Wolfpack wrote:Leckie mentions Barrett doing drums for the 3rd album.
I've never heard anything with drums from those sessions.
Around 3.40 I think I hear drums coming in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YywweGClCoE
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by Argantonio »

vizor wrote:
des Esseintes wrote:A result in all this has now been uncovered: Vegetable Man was a Barrett recording that had nothing to do with Pink Floyd
Well, it was written during the Floyd days, played live during the Floyd days and recorded during the Floyd days with the Floyds. There is no way you can be right. It has no value... No, not even as an opinion.

THANKS A LOT to Mr. Embryo for having posted this.
I really appreciate it. And now, I will have a good listen to it :D
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by vizor »

Argantonio wrote:
vizor wrote:
Well, it was written during the Floyd days, played live during the Floyd days and recorded during the Floyd days with the Floyds. There is no way you can be right. It has no value... No, not even as an opinion. :D
Common knowledge derived from what is basically available to the general public is different than the intensive study that makes your life so specialized.

Your statement, assuming that you WEREN'T there, says that Vegetable Man was written during the Floyd days. Your source, like mine, was written differently. I recall reading that Syd wrote this in his kitchen in an hour, recorded it in the next hour, and all this time later, the interviwee says he recorded Vegetable Man. I know of no other recording than the poor-quality recording available to anyone. The interviewee's claim, therefore, makes sense to me as all of Syd's solo works are poor in comparison to PATGOD. In Vegetable Man, he sounds ill, and all other solo recordings he sounds ill.

Where I read this may be on my shelf or not. I don't care to relay at this time, or anytime in the future, my impression of my recollection, as faded as it may be. But I am sure it was from a published book, which may be far upgraded by writers who have picked up information that the powers-that-be might have fed out.

We are told only what they want to tell us. So nobody really knows what is in the contracts, the understandings of 'rejoining the band', of 'reuniting' and that songs from Animals or The Final Cut are never to be performed. Who knows what's behind the truths.

I played fair in writing my disclaimer that I do not know everything. Nor do I care that I don't. I have different interests, and use the music of Pink Floyd and the internet forums for useful and valid reasons. I have lots of opinions of what I see goes on around on the forums and do a yeomans job of keeping them to myself. When I seldom say something, I reread and edit my text carefully so as not to come off in a way other than what I am. In this instance, I was responding to a person who earnestly contributed something he thought was valuable, and in a span of time, expressed dismay that nobody cared to respond. I agree, and have seen this time and time again in the Syd section of these forums. Case in point: the 40th Anniversary of PATGOD contained a third disc with some unreleased material. One of them Matillda Mother in a different take than what was on the album.

On the forums, nobody made mention of that cut. Nobody. New Syd and nobody has anything to say????? Somebody was writing a review of that 3rd disc, covered up to just the song before and said" gotta go, will finish this up later...." and never did.

Again, on the The Last Minute Put Together Boogie Band release of Syd in 1972. Nobody said anything of this release, his being there, playing and fizzling out, much like the instrumental Lanky Part 1, in which the joy of having that recording is :either he's playing or not playing. Syd in his purest form.

Now whether des Esseintess contribution to this forum was newly discovered or not, nobody made that an issue. On this day, I come across it, find it interesting, and pay respect to help offset the weird factor that yet another Syd topic has been posted, and again, largely ignored. Or at this point, just hasn't garnered up enough excitement to render a 2nd, 3rd and 4th page. And that is what we all want, unless, of course, it's just another Syd release. (sarcasm). But you Argantonio, posted a personal attack on me, because "you know better".

The problem with making it the point that you know better than someone else, is that you made credit to a name that is not his. This trait of yours could be due to your glee in slashing into someone else and not looking to see what you've really done. Mr Embryo is not the French (Google Translate) translation of des Esseintess, and if you notice on the screen left sidebar, you are identified as Embryo too. That is due to your low posting input, and it is really unfortunate that you chose to attack me with your 4th post, as having no right to enjoy and interpret the existence of Pink Floyd, all because you know better. Further, you also wrote to Mr. Embryo that you haven't yet listened to the audio interview (in which I further contributed the valuable info that Part 5 has additional information of the very reason the post was made to begin with!) and that makes you ignorant at the time of your writing. So until you listen through the interview, you wont know if there is something for even you to learn.

Pink Floyd may have played Vegetable Man at concerts that were illegally recorded, I'm sure I have heard any such recordings. But I am not a scholar of everything they have ever done, I am just a consumer of their music that can be obtained in any common record store. From there, for my own purposes, I obtain an amount of inspiration that translates into the really cool work I do. In addition, I peruse the forums as entertainment, observe and refrain a whole hell of a lot because I know there are specialists that know better. But really......

I think des Esseintess made a valuable contribution. There's a ton of info ground down into all media on Pink Floyd, who they are and how they came to be. I only pick and choose at random, and to hear an actual unsung recording engineer who touched Syd at such a late time in his career was a surprise as much as of George Martin interviews on how he recorded the Beatles when he passed away. Now: Gotta go.....
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by mastaflatch »

I recall reading that Syd wrote this in his kitchen in an hour, recorded it in the next hour
Maybe Syd wrote it in an hour in his kitchen while Peter Jenner was there but there's no way he recorded it the next hour unless in a very rough demo form that nobody outside the Floyd camp ever heard.
...and all this time later, the interviwee says he recorded Vegetable Man.
Nope, Leckie (who isn't an unsung engineer by the way) said he mixed it when Syd decided to not show up at the studio sessions anymore - much later (in the mid 70s). Leckie said that Vegetable Man was recorded at Pye Studios with Brian Humphries - same studio and same engineer as Arnold Layne and See Emily Play ( edit: although I'm not too sure about this - I remember they went to Sound Techniques Studios for those - maybe Pye is another name for them?).

Apart from that, you mention the lack of enthusiasm for newly discovered Syd releases or info - first, I'm sure that all the stuff you mentionned has been discussed at some point on this board but maybe not in the Syd forum because some of them were made when he was still in Pink Floyd. Secondly, you do realize that no matter how popular PF became, Syd Barrett's stuff will forever be too weird (or too good) for the masses. It's often way too innovative for many people, let alone those who think that The Division Bell is psychedelic music lol.
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by Phantom Turnip »

mastaflatch wrote:It's often way too innovative for many people, let alone those who think that The Division Bell is psychedelic music lol.
There are people who think The Division Bell is psychedelic, seriously? :shock:
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by mastaflatch »

Phantom Turnip wrote:
mastaflatch wrote:It's often way too innovative for many people, let alone those who think that The Division Bell is psychedelic music lol.
There are people who think The Division Bell is psychedelic, seriously? :shock:
Well, yeah, I guess, people linking the Pink Floyd name de facto to psychedelic music. I've met quite a few of them ](*,)
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by jtull »

Is a "Momentary Lapse Of Reason" psychedelic album? 8)
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by mastaflatch »

jtull wrote:Is a "Momentary Lapse Of Reason" psychedelic album? 8)
Chew on a few acids and it may well be the ultimate one-two badtrip punch with Radio KAOS <.8.>
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Re: Audio interview with 'Barrett' engineer John Leckie

Post by Phantom Turnip »

mastaflatch wrote:Well, yeah, I guess, people linking the Pink Floyd name de facto to psychedelic music. I've met quite a few of them ](*,)
Oh yeah, I know those people too. Pink Floyd = acid trips in space. I mean, what other meaning could there be in songs like "Summer '68" and "Money"?