The first time Alice Cooper met Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd
For many years, Alice Cooper was a drinking buddy to the stars whenever they were in Los Angeles. He was guaranteed to make anybody have an enjoyable time whenever they traipsed through California or simply provide them with a place to stay and a warm roof over their head, as Pink Floyd discovered in 1967.
At the time, Cooper was only a fledgling musician, but his band had already started to become a recognised face in Los Angeles. They were yet to officially release any material and were just gigging on the local circuit shortly after making the city their permanent base. When Pink Floyd first travelled to America, they were at a more advanced stage of their career than Alice Cooper but were still relative nobodies, as their bank balance reflected.
At the time, they’d recently released their debut album, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, Syd Barrett was still a member of the group, and David Gilmour was yet to join. However, America was yet to take notice of the band on a wide-scale level, and their first jaunt saw them start from the bottom of the ladder once more.
Cooper later recalled to Louder Sound: “We had a house in Los Angeles. We weren’t a big deal at the time, we were just this local band called Alice Cooper. Then this group from England called Pink Floyd came over. Not many people had heard of them, but we knew all about them. We had a copy of [Floyd’s 1967 debut] The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn. They were a big deal to us because they had a record out – and we didn’t.”
He continued: “So the Floyd came into town, ran out of money – like everyone else does in LA – and ended up staying in our house. Syd Barrett was just so out there. I’d get up in the morning and go into the kitchen, and Syd would be sitting there with a box of cornflakes in front of him. He’d be watching that box of cornflakes the way I would watch television. We’d all sit around whispering: ‘How can anybody get that high?’ But Syd was also very bipolar. We didn’t find out until later that he was half-high, half-insane. That’s a very bad combination.”
While hanging with Pink Floyd was sometimes uncomfortable, there were also some fruitful moments during their stay. Cooper explained: “We had an audition at Gazarri’s, and Pink Floyd said they’d come down with us. They made brownies. They were totally laced, of course. I was halfway through the show, and all of a sudden I was… oooooh… errrrrr… the world went that way. I fell off the stage, like, three times. We got the job, though. We were so whacked out that the guys at Gazarri’s said: ‘Okay, we’ll hire you.'”
Within a few years, they were two of the biggest acts on the planet, and those days of living in compromising conditions of Los Angeles were a far cry from the life of luxury they’d go on to lead. Unfortunately for Syd Barrett, his health conditions would spiral, and he’d left the music industry before Pink Floyd ascended to superstardom.
