A History of Pink Floyd

The beginning

Roger Waters and Nick Mason met while studying architecture at the London Polytechnic at Regent Street. The pair first played together in a group formed by Keith Noble and Clive Metcalfe with Noble's sister Sheilagh. They were later joined by fellow student Richard Wright, becoming a sextet named Sigma 6, the first band to feature Waters ('rudimentary" lead guitar), Wright (rhythm guitar), and Mason (drums). When Sheilagh later left the group, Wright's girlfriend, Poly student Juliet Gale, became a regular guest singer. The band started performing during private functions, while rehearsing in a tearoom in the basement of Regent Street Polytechnic. They covered songs by The Searchers and material written by their manager and songwriter, fellow student Ken Chapman.

 

In September 1963 Waters and Mason moved into a flat at 39 Stanhope Gardens near Crouch End, London, owned by Mike Leonard, a part-time tutor at the Regent Street Polytechnic and Hornsey College of Art. Leonard was a designer of light machines (perforated discs spun by electric motors to cast patterns of lights on the walls) and for a time played keyboard with them using the front room of his flat for rehearsals. Mason later moved out of the flat, and guitar player Bob Klose moved in. Sigma 6 went through a number of other short-lived names, including The Meggadeaths, The (Screaming) Abdabs, Leonard's Lodgers, and The Spectrum Five before settling on The Tea Set. While Metcalfe and Noble left to form their own band, Klose and Waters were joined at Stanhope Gardens by Syd Barrett in 1964. Then aged 17, Barrett had arrived in London in the autumn of 1963 to study at the Camberwell College of Art. Waters and Barrett were childhood friends; the bassist had often visited Barrett as he played guitar at his mother's house. In his book Mason said this about Barrett, "In a period when everyone was being cool in a very adolescent, self-conscious way, Syd was unfashionably outgoing; my enduring memory of our first encounter is the fact that he bothered to come up and introduce himself to me." 

 

After The Tea Set lost Noble and Metcalfe's vocal abilities, Klose introduced the band to Chris Dennis, a technician with the Royal Air Force. Soon after, Dennis was posted to Bahrain, thrusting Barrett into the spotlight as front-man. They first performed in a recording studio in December 1964, minus the presence of Wright who was taking a break from his studies. Through one of his friends, who let them use some "down time" for free, they managed to secure recording time at a studio in West Hampstead. This four-song session became The Tea Set's first demo tape and included: the R and B classic "I'm a King Bee", and three Syd Barrett originals, "Butterfly", "Lucy Leave", and "Double O Bo", which was, according to Mason, "Bo Diddley meets the 007 theme".

 

They became the resident band at the Countdown Club, near Kensington High Street in London, where from late night until early morning they played three sets of 90 minutes. According to Mason, this period "... was the beginning of a realization that songs could be extended with lengthy solos." An audition for ITV's Ready Steady Go! soon followed (they were invited by the program's producers to return the following week), as did another club, and two rock contests. After pressure from his father, and advice from his college tutors, Bob Klose quit during the summer of 1965 and Barrett took over on lead guitar. Sometime in autumn the band were first referred to as "The Pink Floyd Sound", a name created by Barrett on the sput of the moment when he discovered that another band, also called The Tea Set, were to perform at one of their gigs. (The name is derived from the given names of two blues musicians whose Piedmont blues records Barrett had in his collection, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council). Playing mostly rhythm and blues songs they began to receive paid bookings, including one for a performance at the Marquee Club in March 1966 where they were watched by Peter Jenner. A lecturer at the London School of Economics, Jenner was impressed by the acoustic effects Barrett and Wright created and, with his business partner and friend Andrew King, became their manager. The pair had little experience of the music industry and used inherited money to set up Blackhill Enterprises, purchasing new instruments and equipment for the band including a Selmer PA system. Under their guidance the band became part of London's underground music scene, playing at venues including All Saints Hall and The Marquee. While performing at the Countdown Club the band had experimented with long instrumental excursions and they began to expand upon these with rudimentary but visually powerful light shows, projected by colored slides and domestic lights. To celebrate the launch of the London Free School's magazine International Times, they performed in front of a 2,000-strong crowd at the opening of The Roundhouse, attended by celebrities including Alexander Trocchi, Paul McCartney, and Marianne Faithfull. Jenner and King's diverse array of social connections helped gain the band important coverage in The Financial Times and The Sunday Times.

 

Their financial relationship with Blackhill Enterprises was strengthened when they became equal partners, each holding an "unprecedented" one-sixth share. By October 1966 their set included more of their own material, and they performed at venues such as the Commonwealth Institute, but were not universally popular; following a performance at a Catholic youth club the owner refused to pay, a stance which the magistrate agreed with, claiming that the band's performance "wasn't music". This was not the only occasion on which they encountered such opinions. They were better received at the UFO Club in London. Barrett's performances were reportedly exuberant, "... leaping around and the madness, and the kind of improvisation he was doing... he was inspired. He would constantly manage to get past his limitations and into areas that were very, very interesting. Which none of the others could do." The audiences were receptive to the music they played, often high on various drugs, although the band remained drug-free: "We were out of it, not on acid, but out of the loop, stuck in the dressing room at UFO."

Signing with EMI

According to Mason, the psychedelic movement had "taken place around us - not within us". Nevertheless, The Pink Floyd Sound were present at the head of a wave of interest in psychedelic music and what would later be called space rock, and began to attract the attention of the music industry. While in negotiations with record companies, Joe Boyd and booking agent Bryan Morrison arranged for, and funded, the recording of several songs at Sound Techniques in West Hampstead, including "Arnold Layne" and a version of "Interstellar Overdrive", and for the production of a short music film for "Arnold Layne" in Sussex. Despite early interest from Polydor the band signed with Electric and Musical Industries, with a $5,000 advance. Boyd was not included in the deal.

"Arnold Layne" became Pink Floyd's (the definite article seems to have dropped from the band's name at some point in 1967) first single, released on March 11, 1967. Its references to cross-dressing saw it banned by several radio stations, but some creative manipulation at the shops which supplied sales figures to the music industry meant that it peaked in the UK charts at number 20.

On April 20, 1967 they headlined a famous all-night event called The 14 Hour Technicolor Dream at the Alexandra Palace, London, to raise funds for the counter-cultural newspaper International Times. Other artists included Yoko Ono. They played "Astronomy Domine", "Arnold Layne", "Interstellar Overdrive", "Nick's Boogie", and other material from what was to become their debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Serendipitously, the band appeared just as the sun was beginning to rise at around five o'clock in the morning.

All four members of the band had by then abandoned their studies or jobs. They upgraded their aging Bedford van to a Ford Transit, using it to travel to over 200 gigs in 1967 (a tenfold increase on the previous year). They were joined by road manager Peter Wynne Willson, with whom Barrett had previously shared a flat. Willson updated the band's lighting rig, with some innovative ideas including the use of polarisers, mirrors and stretched condoms. "See Emily Play" was the group's second single, released on June 16. It premiered at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London in May that year, where the band also used a device called an Azimuth co-ordinator. They performed on the BBC's Look of the Week, where an erudite and engaging Waters and Barrett faced rigorous questioning from Hans Keller. The single fared slightly better than "Arnold Layne" and after two weeks at number 17 in the charts. They were invited to appear on the BBC's Top of the Pops, which was immensely popular but which controversially required artists to simply mime their singing and playing. They returned after the single climbed to number six, but a scheduled third appearance was cancelled when Barrett refused to perform.

It was about this time the rest of the band first noticed changes in Barrett's behavior. By early 1967 he was regularly using LSD and, at an earlier show in the Netherlands, Mason observed him to be "completely distanced from everything going on, whether simply tripping or suffering from a more organic neural disturbance I still have no idea."

The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

Pink Floyd's contract with EMI had been negotiated by their agent Bryan Morrison and EMI producer Norman Smith. They were obliged to record their first album at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London. They were experimented with musique concrete and were at one point invited to watch The Beatles record "Lovely Rita". In his 2005 autobiography Mason recalled that the sessions were relatively trouble-free. Smith disagreed, stating that Barrett was unresponsive to his suggestions and constructive criticism. The Piper at the Gates of Dawn was released in August 1967 and Pink Floyd continued to draw huge crowds at the UFO Club, but Barrett's deterioration was by then giving them serious concern. The rest of the band initially hoped that his erratic behavior would be a passing phase but some, including Jenner and June Child, were more realistic: "I found him in the dressing room and he was so... gone. Roger Waters and I got him on his feet, we got him out to the stage... and of course the audience went spare because they loved him. The band started to play and Syd just stood there. He had his guitar around his neck and his arms just hanging down."

To their consternation the band was forced to cancel their appearance at the prestigious National Jazz and Blues Festival, informing the music press that Barrett was suffering from nervous exhaustion. Jenner and Waters arranged for Barrett to see a psychiatrist (he did not attend the appointment); a stay in Formentera, with Sam Hutt, a doctor well-established in the underground music scene, led to no visible improvement. A few dates in September were followed by the band's first tour of the United States. Blackhill's late application for work permits forced the band to cancel several dates and Barrett's condition grew steadily worse. He detuned his guitar during a performance at the Winterland Ballroom, causing the strings to come off; during a recording for The Pat Boone Show he confounded the director by miming the song perfectly during the rehearsal, then standing motionless during the take. King quickly curtailed the band's US visit, sending them home on the next flight.

Shortly after their return from the US the band supported Jimi Hendrix's tour of England, where on one date at Chatham in Kent, Nick Mason played his drums out of view behind the amps rather than use the tour kit. But Barrett's depression worsened the longer the tour continued. His absence on one occasion forced the band to book David O'List as his replacement. Wynne Willson left his role as lighting manager and allied himself with the guitarist. Pink Floyd released the single "Apples and Oranges" in November 1967 in the UK (although not in the US). Barrett's condition had reached a crisis point, and they responded my adding a new member to their line-up.

Gilmour replaces Barrett

Barrett had recently suggested adding four new members: in the words of Waters, "two freaks he'd met somewhere. One of them played the banjo, the other the saxophone... [and] a couple of chick singers". In December 1967 the band asked David Gilmour to become the fifth member of Pink Floyd; Gilmour accepted. He was previously acquainted with Barrett, having studied with him at Cambridge Tech in the early 1960s. Two had performances at lunchtimes together with guitars and harmonicas, and later hitch-hiked and busked their way around the south of France. In 1965, while a member of Joker's Wild, Gilmour had watched The Tea Set. Barrett reluctantly agreed to Gilmour's addition to Pink Floyd. Steve O'Rourke (an assistant to Bryan Morrison) gave Gilmour a room at his house and a salary of $30 per week. Gilmour immediately went out and bought a custom-made yellow Fender Stratocaster from a music shop in Cambridge (the instrument became one of Gilmour's favorite guitars throughout his career with Pink Floyd) and in January 1968 he was announced as the band's newest member. To the general public he was then the second guitarist, the fifth member of Pink Floyd, and the group originally intended to keep Barrett in the group as a non-performing songwriter. According to Jenner, "The idea was that Dave would... cover for [Barrett's] eccentricities and when that got to be not workable, Syd was just going to write. Just to try to keep him involved, but in a way where the others could work and function." One of Gilmour's first duties was to pretend to play a guitar on an "Apples and Oranges" promotional film. In a demonstration of his frustration at being effectively sidelined, Barrett tried to teach the band a new song, "Have You Got It Yet?", but changed the structure on each performance - making it impossible for them to learn.

Working with Barrett eventually proved too difficult and matters came to a head en route to a performance in Southampton when someone in the van asked if they should collect Barrett, the response was "No, fuck it, let's not bother". Waters later admitted, "He was out friend, but most of the time we now wanted to strangle him". In early March 1968 they met with business partners Peter Jenner and Andrew King of Blackhill Enterprises, to discuss the band's future. Barrett agreed to leave and Pink Floyd "agreed to Blackhill's entitlement in perpetuity" with regard to "past activities". Jenner and King, who believed Barrett to be the creative genius of the band, decided to represent him and end their relationship with Pink Floyd. Bryan Morrison then agreed that Steve O'Rourke should become the group's manager. A formal announcement about Barrett's departure was made on April 6, 1968 though for a short period after, he would turn up at occasional gigs, apparently confused about his standing with the band. Gilmour mimed to his voice on the group's European television appearances but while playing on the university circuit, Waters and Wright created their own new material, such as "It Would Be So Nice" and "Careful with That Axe, Eugene". They were joined by road manager Peter Watts before touring Europe in 1968. In early 1969, perhaps because of their space-related music and lyrics, they were part of the live BBC television coverage of the Apollo 11 moon landing, performing an instrumental piece which they called "Moonhead". An audio copy exists of the track and occasionally appears on bootleg albums.

A Saucerful of Secrets

For their second studio album the band returned to Smith and Abbey Road Studios. Three songs featuring Barrett were used, including "Jugband Blues" (his final contribution to their discography), and the Waters composition, "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" (which includes guitar work by Gilmour and Barrett). Waters also contributed "Let There Be More Light" and "Corporal Clegg", while Wright composed "See-Saw" and "Remember a Day" (Barrett played slide guitar on the latter). Encouraged by Smith, some of the new material was recorded at their homes, continuing the type of experimentation seen on The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Smith remained unconvinced by their musical style, and when Mason struggled to perform on "Remember a Day", he stepped in as his replacement. Wright recalled Smith's attitude about the sessions, "Norman gave up on the second album... he was forever saying things like, 'You can't do twenty minutes of this ridiculous noise.'" Neither Waters nor Mason could read music so to create the album's title track, "A Saucerful of Secrets", they invented their own system of notation; Gilmour later described this as looking "... like an architectural diagram".

A Saucerful of Secrets was released in June 1968. The album cover was designed by Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell of Hipgnosis. Record Mirror, despite a generally favorable review, urged listeners to "forget it as background music to a party". John Peel described a live performance of the title track as "like a religious experience", while NME, viewed the song as "long and boring" with "little to warrant its monotonous direction". Upon the album's release Pink Floyd performed at the first free Hyde Park concert, organized by Blackhill Enterprises, alongside Roy Harper and Jethro Tull. The band admired Morrison's assistant Steve O'Rourke, a "great deal-maker", whose business acumen overshadowed his lack of interest in aesthetic matters, so when Morrison sold his business to NEMS Enterprises, O'Rourke became the band's personal manager, enabling them to take complete control of their artistic direction. They returned to the US for their first major tour, accompanied by Soft Machine and The Who.

Soundtracks

In 1968 the band recorded a film score for The Committee. In December of that year they released "Point Me At the Sky", no more successful than the two singles they had released since "See Emily Play", it would be the band's last for several years. In 1969 they recorded the score for Barbet Schroeder's film More. The soundtrack proved important; not only did it pay well but, along with A Saucerful of Secrets, the material they created became part of their live shows for some time thereafter. A tour of the UK ended at the Royal Festival Hall in July 1969, during which an electric shock caused by poor grounding sent Gilmour flying across the stage. The performances, built around two long pieces called The Man and The Journey, were backed with performance art created by artist Peter Dockley. Some of the sound effects were later used on 1970's "Alan Psychedelic Breakfast". While composing the soundtrack for director Michelangelo Antonioni's film Zabriskie Point, the band stayed at a luxury hotel in Rome. Waters has since claimed that, but for Antonioni's continuous changes to the music, the work could have been completed in less than a week. Eventually he used only three of their recordings, in addition to material from the Grateful Dead, The Youngbloods, Patti Page, Roscoe Holcomb, and the Rolling Stones. One of the pieces turned down by Antonioni, called "The Violent Sequence", later became "Us and Them", included on 1973's The Dark Side of the Moon. The band also worked on the soundtrack for a proposed cartoon series called Rollo but a lack of funds meant that it was never produced. Waters collaborated with Ron Geesin on the soundtrack to the 1970 film The Body.