This informative double-disc documentary was originally part of the BBC’s Omnibus series in 2001. This is a repackage of the ‘deluxe’ DVD edition released in 2006, and if you’re a Floyd fan and haven’t seen it yet, it’s well worth a few hours of your time and a tenner of your money.
The Beeb’s Kirsty Wark narrates the early life of ‘Syd The Beat’, with interview contributions Waters, Gilmour, Mason and Wright, their first guitarist Bob Klose and other important figures from their formative years. With plenty of archive footage (including that of Syd’s first drug-induced trip) and input from Robyn Hitchcock and Blur’s Graham Coxon, it’s a solid, superior 50-minute account of the band’s rise and their founder’s parallel decline. What a beautiful, creative young man he was, and what a sad fate he had.
You’ll feel almost guilty for enjoying the extraordinary music of The Madcap Laughs, its making nicely recounted here. Disc two comprises the interviews with all Floyd members in extended, unedited form. Gilmour’s unflinching account of the transition between the two of them is particularly striking: after just five gigs, “We ceased to go and pick him up.”
Via Eagle Rock
