, guitarist
, and painter
, best remembered as a founding member of the band Pink Floyd
. He was the lead vocalist, guitarist and primary songwriter during the band's psychedelic
years, providing major musical and stylistic direction in their early work, including their name. He left the group in 1968 amid speculations of mental illness exacerbated by drugs, and was briefly hospitalised.
Besides being a pioneer in psychedelic rock with his expressive guitar playing and imaginative compositions, Barrett was also a pioneer in the space rock
and psychedelic folk genres.
All middle men are bad.
I don't think I'm easy to talk about. I've got a very irregular head. And I'm not anything that you think I am anyway.
And what exactly is a dream, and what exactly is a joke?
It's awfully considerate of you to think of me here, and I'm most obliged to you for making it clear that I'm not here.
Well, I'm a painter, I was trained as a painter…I seem to have spent a little less time painting than I might've done…But it didn't transcend the feeling of playing at UFO and those sort of places with the lights and that, the fact that the group was getting bigger and bigger.
That's all I wanted to do as a kid. Play a guitar properly and jump around. But too many people got in the way.
Well, I've got a colour telly, and a fridge. I've got some pork chops in the fridge, but the chops keep going off, so I have to keep buying more.
We feel that in the future, groups are going to have to offer much more than just a pop show. They'll have to offer a well-presented theatre show.