Pink Floyd 1967

For some reason, I am repeatedly drawn to early Pink Floyd videos on YouTube...I'm not quite sure why, though I am, of course, a fan. But there are so MANY old videos of the band on YouTube - I am surprised that the band hasn't gathered them up and released them, for they provide an amazing capsule of the time in which they first appeared, London in 1967.

Though they took several years to really break the States, The Pink Floyd was an immediate sensation in London, where they were like the Grateful Dead but with a charismatic front man in Syd Barrett, as well as hit singles right out of the box. No less than Paul McCartney even annointed them the next big thing in British rock that same year.

What is also funny is the way in which they were received by the establishment. Some heralded them as the avant garde of electronic music, which in some ways they were, but others, like the twit who interviews them here, clearly disdained them. "Why has it all got to be so terribly loud?" and asks it with such cartoon-ish condescension that the band comes off as far more intelligent and gentlemanly.

Here they are playing "Astronomy Domine" the opening song from their now-40-year-old debut album, Piper at the Gates of Dawn, with Syd still in control of his talents.




And here's a real curio - film purporting to be of Syd's first acid trip. He has very short hair, and is clearly irritated at being film (he seems to mouth "oh, fuck off" at one point. It's 10 minutes long, don't feel obliged to watch the whole thing, though there's some other home footage of Syd at a latter date. But it's just a fascinating little bit of pop history.

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And here's footage from the famous UFO Club, which was acid central for London's summer of love, 1967. Pink Floyd was, essentially, the house band. People are trippin'!


And this is "Apples and Oranges," the failed follow-up to "Arnold Layne" and "See Emily Play," and Syd's last main contribution to the band, played on TV. Syd can't be bothered to lip-sync.



Finally, this is the band's promo video of "Apples and Oranges," with David Gilmour now substituting for Syd, who had been fired by the band he once fronted. The song still sucked, though...