“The Piper at the Gates of Dawn” (Pink Floyd)
The original lineup of Pink Floyd perform “Astronomy Domine” from Piper At The Gates Of Dawn live on the BBC. Interview and comments by Hanz Keller, 1967
(via who write:)
extraordinary on so many counts. For one thing, it captures the band performing, rather than miming, “Astronomy Domine,” the effects-laden song that opens their debut album,
The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
which is just now getting its lavish 40th-anniversary rerelease. For another, it captures Syd Barrett actually talking–and not just talking, but chatting thoughtfully, lucidly, and with remarkable equanimity given the hostile questions of his interviewer.The segment’s presenter is Hans Keller, a prominent and controversial music critic and theorist of the era. In his introductory segment, he might as well be John Cleese. With his posh-Viennese accent, Murrowesque cigarette, and a pushbroom mustache that seems to have come from the prop department, he cocks his head contemptuously and asserts of the band, “Proportionately, they are a bit boring.” And then he allows, disingenuously, that “Perhaps it’s my fault that I don’t appreciate them.”
In the post-performance interview, which begins about five minutes into the clip, Keller kicks things off by asking Barrett and Roger Waters, “Why has it all got to be so terribly loud?” The two Floydians, well-brought-up boys from Cambridge, answer this and all of Keller’s questions with remarkable politeness. But Waters palpably seethes under his veneer of good manners, while Barrett remains unprovoked. (Though his occasional smiling glances at Waters hint that he finds Keller’s tone absurd.)
The outgoing announcer calls the song, Games for May. Ooops. Also, hard to visualize this incarnation of Pink Floyd playing in a ballroom or dance hall, as background noise for people to “jig about to”, as Roger Waters puts it.
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