Syd Barrett: The Madcap Laughs/Barrett/Opel

IN A RECENT EDITION OF A MAGAZINE THAT SHALL REMAIN nameless, some clever-dick had this to say: "No-one likes Syd Barrett except for the kind of appalling undergraduates who smoke Oxo cubes." That was unfair, flip and silly. And yet there's no smoke without...Let us be honest, Syd's music (a slim output) was never the same after he went dotty and was prised off the wall of the The Pink Floyd. 'Arnold Layne', 'See Emily Play', 'Apples And Oranges', 'Astronomy Domine'... such feats could not be repeated.