Reinventing Pink Floyd

When Syd Barrett left (or was dismissed) from Pink Floyd, there was good reason to think that the band was over. Not only was Barrett the good-looking and charismatic front man of the group/he was also its founder, leader, primary songwriter and musical guiding light. As a result, the very public face of Pink Floyd in 1967 and early 1968 was Barrett. The remaining members of the band (Roger Waters, Richard Wright, Nick Mason, and new guitarist David Gilmour) were creatively set adrift: while they still had a record deal, none of the group's members had a distinctive songwriting style that could pick up where Barrett left off. In just over five years (January 1968 to March 1973), Pink Floyd went from a band without managers and a primary songwriter to the group that released one of the most popular albums of the rock era, and in popular music in general. Reinventing Pink Floyd will explore the path taken by the remaining band members to establish a musical identity, develop a songwriting style, and create a new template for the manner in which albums are made and even enjoyed by listeners. As Bill Kopp will illustrate, that path was filled with failed experiments, creative blind alleys, one-off musical excursions, abortive collaborations, a general restlessness and - most importantly - a dedicated search for a distinctive musical personality. The six albums Pink Floyd released between Barrett's departure and the release of The Dark Side of the Moon all but flopped, achieving no singles in the United States or UK and remaining unknown to a majority of the general listening public. Even within musical projects that might have been viewed - even by the band itself - as failures, hindsight reveals a distinct foreshadowing of the musical, lyrical and production-oriented approaches and themes of Pink Floyd's best and most beloved work.