How To Create Syd Barrett Music

This week’s “Meth Minute 39″ cartoon is about the late great Syd Barrett. For those of you who are unaware, Barrett was the original singer for Pink Floyd until he drifted off into a insane world of LSD fantasy and became a mysterious recluse.

For the cartoon’s soundtrack, I needed to create some songs that sound just like Barrett’s own. I turned to my friend William Rahilly, a longtime musical collaborator. Will has a closet-sized recording space in Brooklyn crowded with instruments, analog-replicating tube amps and more.

First, I had made a list of words and phrases that I felt like Syd would use in his lyrics.

Then Will started strumming his acoustic and I put together some lyrics with the words from the list.

Next, we started recording all the instrumental tracks.

Finally I laid down my Syd Barrett imposter vocals.

And that’s all it took. Without further ado, here is the outcome: