LONDRA - E’ morto Syd Barrett, co-fondatore dei Pink Floyd e figura di spicco del progressive rock inglese a cavallo fra la fine degli anni '60 e i primi anni '70: lo ha reso noto un portavoce della vecchia band dell’artista. Barrett aveva 60 anni.
Shine on You crazy Diamond, che la terra ti sia lieve
LUCIFER SAM
Sam Siam cat
Always sitting by your side
Always by your side
That cat’s something I can’t explain Jennifer Gentle you’re a witch
You’re the left side
He’s the right side oh no
That cat’s something I can’t explain Lucifer go to sea
Be a hip cat
Be a ship’s cat
Somewhere anywhere
That cat’s something I can’t explain Night prowling sifting sand
Padding around on the ground
He’ll be found
When you’re around
That cat’s something I can’t explain
“Le ultime cronache vogliono che Barrett (pelato, ingrassato e quasi non vedente) passi le sue giornate chiuso nella dimora dei genitori, uscendo di tanto in tanto per fare la spesa alla sua vecchia madre; si possono reperire nel world wide web articoli e servizi fotografici che (morbosamente e spietatamente) trattano questo triste argomento.”
Muore qui la speranza di poterlo ancora sentire un giorno parlare, dire, cantare, fare qualsiasi cosa rompendo un silenzio durato un’infinità. E il Barrett post-Floyd era ancora una grande realtà, come testimoniano alcuni pezzi di BARRETT, MADCAP LAUGHS, le outtakes di OPEL. E’ finito tutto troppo presto, per una delle pochissime leggende (fino a poche ore fa) viventi del nostro pianeta. Per molti un’icona autentica.
[i]
It is with great distress and sadness that I learned the news of Syd Barrett’s death. Although only 60 years old, to put an age on someone as timeless and mythical as Syd is like dating the Pyramids or Stonehenge - I’m sure if we’d learned that he was 10,000 years old, no one would have been particularly shocked. He had not contributed anything artistically to the public domain since the very early '70s, but somehow knowing that he was still there somewhere in Cambridge, albeit in a supposedly vegetative state, was in some way reassuring. That his body and his soul must now be consigned to the Underworld makes all of us several psychic megatonnes lighter tonight.
When I was given my first Barrett album by my then-girlfriend Jane Smith in 1973, Syd was already lamented as a probable casualty of the '60s. At that point, 36 months since his last release, we’d all hoped for some sort of artistic rebirth, however reduced that statement may have been. It’s difficult now in the early 21st Century to explain just how divided were the opposing pro-Barrett and pro-Pink Floyd camps. We can gain some solace from Roky Erikson’s return to public appearances, but not much - as Syd has quit this planet far too young.
I refuse to sign off with any dubious lyrical conceit, because I’m crying too much. Syd: thanks for staying as long as you did.
Segnalo sul Manifesto di oggi, oltre al paginone a lui dedicato, anche un simpatico articoletto riguardante la musica dei Pink Floyd in relazione al cinema.
Da domani disponibile anche on line sul sito del quotidiano.