Tuesday 19th July

I had heard ‘Arnold Layne’ on the radio.  It was different, but every record by everyone was different then, each Beatles record leapfrogging the last to new heights.  So, imagine my surprise and excitement when I heard that Pink Floyd were going to be appearing live at Stowmarket Carnival in a few weeks time.  Now Stowmarket had truly earned it’s description as a sleepy market town, nothing ever happened there – and still doesn’t.  The annual highlight was the Carnival, where ‘floats’ were decorated by local organizations and groups and were driven through the town to the excitement of all; there was also a funfair and a few other events – but someone had for some unfathomable reason decided to have a pop concert at the local soccer ground and even more inexplicably had booked Pink Floyd, who were then denizens of the underworld, playing to the nascent hippy and psychedelic scene in London.  This was 1967, the year of flower power and I was just sixteen and open to suggestion, besides I loved the new music pouring out of California…”If you’re going to San Francisco’…

For some reason also lost in the mystery of time I and a few friends got to the football ground really early, a bar was already open and armed with glasses of Stout and Cider were lounging around.  When , suddenly we met Pink Floyd.  Yes, in those halcyon days ‘Pop Stars’ often mingled with the crowd before a gig.  Syd Barrett, Rick Wright, Nick Mason and Roger Waters chatted to a few of us as if we were old friends.  They all had long hair and wore cool clothes and we talked about music and girls and stuff.  I even got all their signatures on a ten shilling note.  “See Emily Play” had been released a few weeks ago and the crowd was enormous.  As it started to get dark they left and were on stage.  To say they was incredible would be an understatement, they were years ahead of their time and started straight into ‘Careful with that Axe, Eugene’ and other far out numbers.  The light show was, for the time incredible, but in reality was little more than squidgy oils beamed onto white sheets – but we were impressed.  I really got out of my head, not only on the music but on several pints more of stout and cider.  Dead drunk I might have been but the idea had arrived in my head that I must get away from Stowmarket.  London was the destination; how and when I hadn’t quite worked out, but thanks in part to Pink Floyd I had decided to leave….

By the way the ten shilling note, which would be worth a fortune today was spent later that same evening on pints of stout and cider; well, how was I to know how famous they would become.