Pink Floyd’s Syd Barrett Handwritten Lyrics Going to Auction
Syd Barret’s Handwritten lyrics are going up for auction through Bonham Auction House in London. The two pages of handwritten lyrics and musical chords for an unreleased Pink Floyd song…
Pink Floyd (L-R): Roger Waters, Nick Mason, Syd Barrett and Rick Wright.
Keystone Features / GettyimagesSyd Barret's Handwritten lyrics are going up for auction through Bonham Auction House in London. The two pages of handwritten lyrics and musical chords for an unreleased Pink Floyd song called "Vegetable Man" are expected to go for somewhere between $23,000 - $46,00.
According to the Bonham website, this song was originally a part of the band's second album, A Saucer Full of Secrets. The song was later pulled. The band DID perform the song for a BBC Special.
Per Bonham's website: "The song was recorded and broadcast for a BBC Radio One Top Gear session on 20 December 1967 at BBC Maida Vale Studios. Let's give "Vegetable Man" a listen...
The YouTube clip above is the song only. I had a hard time finding decent audio (it was recorded in 1967). I did find the actual BBC performance, but the sound quality is considerably muddier. Here's the best audio I could find from the BBC One Top Gear performance:
Syd Barrett was the original face and lead singer of Pink Floyd... he even came up with the band name. Due to a degenerating mental state, the band made the very hard decision to replace Syd with David Gilmour. "Vegetable Man" was his last BBC performance with Pink Floyd and one of the last songs he wrote for Pink Floyd.
Handwritten lyrics have gone for some INSANE money. The most expensive went for TWO MILLION DOLLARS.
Here's a list of some of the most expensive handwritten lyrics:
#5 John Lennon - "Nowhere Man"
‘Nowhere Man’ marked a shift in John Lennon's writing. It was the first Beatles song that didn't have a love theme of some nature to it. It was the beginning of John Lennon's more philosophical songwriting days. Written in 1965, "Nowhere Man" was a part of Rubber Soul. Rolling Stone Magazine picked Rubber Soul as the 5th greatest record of all time. Lennon’s original lyrics sold for $455,500 at a Christie’s auction in 2003.
#4 The Beatles "A Day in the Life"
The final track on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. "A Day in the Life" gives writing credit (as usual) to Lennon and McCartney, but the song was mainly written by John Lennon (the beginning and end... McCartney wrote the middle section). Lennon's lyrics were mainly inspired by news stories of that time period (1967). The song ends with one of the most famous chords in music history, played on several keyboards, and sustained for over forty seconds. Lennon’s handwritten section of the lyrics sold for $1,202,500 at Sotheby’s in 2010.
#3 Don McLean "American Pie"
Talk about making the most of one signature song... McLean's handwritten lyrics to "American Pie" auctioned for $1,205,000 at Christie's in April 2015. The 16 pages included McLean's original handwritten manuscript complete with explanatory notes and deletions, plus typed drafts. A previously unknown final verse was also included.
#2 The Beatles "All You Need is Love"
The song was originally written for ‘Our World’, the first live international satellite TV show which included segments from 19 different countries. The Beatles were asked by the BBC to write a song and perform it live during the British section, to an international audience of more than 150 million people worldwide. Imagine THAT. John Lennon’s original hand-written lyrics for the song sold at a Cooper Owen auction in 2005 for $1.25 million. Here's a clip from the show:
#1 Bob Dylan "Like a Rolling Stone"
The lyrics to Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" sold for $2m at Sotheby's New York in 2014, setting a new world record. The song is considered one of the most influential compositions in postwar popular music.
The world of rock can be crazy! Check out this list of opening acts and headliners combos that actually happened!
5 Opening Act and Headliner Combos That Actually Happened
New tours are seemingly announced every week. Oftentimes, those tours feature outstanding multi-act lineups and other great supporting acts.
With that in mind, we can't help but think about all of the strange opening acts and headliner combos in rock history, and there have been some doozies.
A great example of this was the Molson Canadian Rocks for Toronto concert in 2003. The show was organized as an economic boom for Toronto, which was hit pretty badly by the SARS outbreak. (It's also why the show is affectionately known as SARSStock. Over 450,000 people attended the show, which featured the headlining lineup of The Rolling Stones, AC/DC, Rush, The Guess Who...and Justin Timberlake.
Bookers and promoters didn't think about how a predominantly rock crowd would react to Timberlake. It's a memory that still sticks with Timberlake, who reflected on it during a February 2020 appearance on BBC's The Graham Norton Show.
"You would think Canadians are historically peaceful people, ... It was a bit of a blur," recalled Timberlake, who at the time had just started his solo career. "I just remember saying to the band before we went on stage, 'I don't think this is going to go well.' Little did I know how bad it was going to go."
So, how bad was it? People threw bottles of urine at him!
Jokingly, Timberlake said, "I still have a lot of trauma from this incident. After the first song, the host of the festival comes out and [tries to wave me off stage,] and I'm like, 'No, man! I'm staying out here! We're doing this!'"
Fans then continued to throw the bottles of urine at him, but things eventually calmed down. Timberlake said, "After [the second song of the set] either one of two things happened: Either they ran out of nerve, because they knew I was going to stay there, or they ran out of urine."
Fortunately, no bottles of urine were involved in the following five examples of strange opening act and headliner combos. However, they all are very interesting and almost baffling that they even happened. Enjoy!
Jimi Hendrix Experience Opening For The Monkees (1967)
Express, Keystone Features/Getty ImagesIn 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience opened for The Monkees. Frankly, it's still amazing this bill was made official, but it is simply one of the strangest bills ever. Considering most of the crowd was there to see The Monkees and likely not old enough to appreciate Hendrix, the group exited the tour after only seven shows, because they were booed every…single…night. (Yes, seriously!)
The Who Opening For Herman’s Hermits (1967)
Steve Wood/Express Newspapers, Keystone/Getty ImagesIn a similar vein as the Jimi Hendrix Experience/The Monkees, The Who during their first tour of the United States ended up opening for Herman’s Hermits. Coincidentally, a young Bruce Springsteen attended a stop on this tour which he fondly remembered at the 2015 MusiCares MAP Fund benefit honoring Pete Townshend. It was the first rock show The Boss had ever attended, and he said it was a game-changer for him.
Bruce Springsteen Opening for Anne Murray (1974)
ohn Minihan/Evening Standard/Hulton Archive, Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesThis infamous moment happened in August 1974 at the Schaefer Music Festival in New York City’s Central Park. While Springsteen’s star was on the rise, Murray was tearing up the singles charts, so it was decided that Murray would headline, and Springsteen would get an opening 80-minute set. Yeah…big mistake. Imagine going on *after* Bruce Springsteen. We wouldn’t wish that on even our greatest enemies.
The Beatles Opening for Brenda Lee (1962)
Daily Express/Archive Photos, Edward Miller/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesWhile just a one-off show, Brenda Lee's performance at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany now lives in infamy, because of her opening act: The Beatles. In an interview with CNN, Lee said after the show, she took a Beatles demo to her label, Decca Records, and tried to score them a record deal. The label reps told her, “That look will never make it, and that sound will never happen.” Oh…how those label reps were kicking themselves a year later.
Lynyrd Skynyrd Opening For Strawberry Alarm Clock (1968)
Frazer Harrison/Getty ImagesPsychedelic rock and southern rock are definitely two genres we can’t imagine together on a double bill, but on select dates of a Strawberry Alarm Clock tour in 1968, Lynyrd Skynyrd provided support. As history would have it, Ed King, founding member of Strawberry Alarm Clock, would later join Skynyrd in 1972 and play on the band’s first three albums until his departure in 1975.
