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Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett (6 January 1946 – 7 July 2006) was an English singer, guitarist and songwriter who co-founded the rock band Pink Floyd in 1965. Barrett was the band's original frontman and primary songwriter, known for his whimsical style of psychedelia, English-accented singing, and stream-of-consciousness writing style. As a guitarist, he was influential for his free-form playing and for employing effects such as dissonance, distortion, echo and feedback. Originally trained as a painter, Barrett was musically active for less than ten years. With Pink Floyd, he recorded the first four singles, their debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1967), portions of their second album A Saucerful of Secrets (1968), and several songs that were not released until years later. In April 1968, Barrett was ousted from the band amid speculation of mental illness and his use of psychedelic drugs. He began a brief solo career in 1969 with the single "Octopus", followed by albums The Madcap Laughs (1970) and Barrett (1970), recorded with the aid of three other members of Pink Floyd. In 1972, Barrett left the music industry, retired from public life, and strictly guarded his privacy until his death. He continued painting and dedicated himself to gardening. Pink Floyd recorded several tributes and homages to him, including the 1975 song suite "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" and parts of the 1979 rock opera The Wall. In 1988, EMI released an album of unreleased tracks and outtakes, Opel, with Barrett's approval. In 1996, Barrett was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Pink Floyd. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2006. Early life Roger Keith Barrett was born on 6 January 1946 in Cambridge to a middle-class family living at 60 Glisson Road. He was the fourth of five children. His father, Arthur Max Barrett, was a prominent pathologist and was said to be related to Elizabeth Garrett Anderson through Max's maternal grandmother Ellen Garrett. In 1951, his family moved to 183 Hills Road, Cambridge. Barrett played piano occasionally but usually preferred writing and drawing. He bought a ukulele aged 10, a banjo at 11 and a Höfner acoustic guitar at 14. A year after he purchased his first acoustic guitar, he bought his first electric guitar and built his own amplifier. He was a Scout with the 7th Cambridge troop and went on to be a patrol leader. Barrett reportedly used the nickname Syd from the age of 14, derived from the name of an old Cambridge jazz bassist, Sid "the Beat" Barrett; Barrett changed the spelling to differentiate himself. By another account, when Barrett was 13, his schoolmates nicknamed him Syd after he came to a field day at Abington Scout site wearing a flat cap instead of his scout beret, because "Syd" was a "working-class" name. He used both names interchangeably for several years. His sister Rosemary said: "He was never Syd at home. He would never have allowed it." At one point at Morley Memorial Junior School, Barrett was taught by the mother of future Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters. Later, in 1957, he attended Cambridgeshire High School for Boys with Waters. His father died of cancer on 11 December 1961, less than a month before Barrett's 16th birthday. On this date, Barrett left the entry in his diary blank. By this time, his siblings had left home and his mother rented out rooms to lodgers. Eager to help her son recover from his grief, Barrett's mother encouraged the band in which he played, Geoff Mott and the Mottoes, a band which Barrett formed, to perform in their front room. Waters and Barrett were childhood friends, and Waters often visited such gigs. At one point, Waters organised a gig, a CND benefit at Friends Meeting House on 11 March 1962, but shortly afterwards Geoff Mott joined the Boston Crabs, and the Mottoes broke up. In September 1962, Barrett took a place at the art department of the Cambridgeshire College of Arts and Technology, where he met David Gilmour. In late 1962 and early 1963, the Beatles made an impact on Barrett, and he began to play Beatles songs at parties and at picnics. In 1963, Barrett became a Rolling Stones fan and, with then-girlfriend Libby Gausden, saw them perform at a village hall in Cambridgeshire. He would cite Jimmy Reed as an influence; however, he remarked that Bo Diddley was his greatest influence. At this point, Barrett started writing songs; one friend recalls hearing "Effervescing Elephant" (later to be recorded on his solo album Barrett). Also around this time, Barrett and Gilmour occasionally played acoustic gigs together. Barrett would refer to Gilmour as "Fred" in letters to girlfriends and relatives. Barrett had played bass guitar with Those Without in mid-1963 and bass and guitar with the Hollerin' Blues the next summer. In 1964, Barrett and Gausden saw Bob Dylan perform. After this performance, Barrett was inspired to write "Bob Dylan Blues". Barrett, now thinking about his future, decided to apply for Camberwell College of Arts in London. He enrolled in the college in the summer of 1964 to study painting. Career Pink Floyd years (1965–1968) Starting in 1964, the band that would become Pink Floyd evolved through various line-up and name changes including the Abdabs, the Screaming Abdabs, Sigma 6 and the Meggadeaths. In 1965, Barrett joined them as the Tea Set (sometimes spelled T-Set). When they found themselves playing a concert with another band of the same name, Barrett came up with the Pink Floyd Sound (also known as the Pink Floyd Blues Band, later the Pink Floyd). During 1965, they went into a studio for the first time, when a friend of Richard Wright's gave the band free time to record. During this summer Barrett had his first LSD trip in the garden of friend Dave Gale, with Ian Moore and Storm Thorgerson. During one trip, Barrett and another friend, Paul Charrier, ended up naked in the bath, reciting: "No rules, no rules". That summer, as a result of the continued drug use, the band became absorbed in Sant Mat, a Sikh sect. Storm Thorgerson (then living on Earlham Street) and Barrett went to a London hotel to meet the sect's guru; Thorgerson managed to join the sect; Barrett, however, was deemed too young to join. Thorgerson saw this as a deeply important event in Barrett's life, as he was extremely upset by the rejection. While living near his friends, Barrett decided to write more songs ("Bike" was written around this time). London underground, Blackhill Enterprises and gigs While Pink Floyd began by playing cover versions of American R&B songs, by 1966 they had carved out their own style of improvised rock and roll, which drew as much from improvised jazz. After Bob Klose departed from the band, the band's direction changed. However, the change was not instantaneous, with more improvising on the guitars and keyboards. Drummer Nick Mason reflected, "It always felt to me that most of the ideas were emanating from Syd at the time." At this time, Barrett's .... Discover the Random House John E Barrett popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Random House John E Barrett books.