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Syd Barrett sometimes behaved strangely, and this has contributed to his status as an icon for people interested in more than just his articulate songwriting. In attempts to understand this, there has been much speculation about his own feelings, or rather about his own so-called "mental states". But what does Syd himself say about how he feels?
In his song "Late Night" he says:
This is a feeling anyone may have experienced, but you have to get inside the song to understand the strange thing: he feels sad and witty at the same time, whether he is with someone or not.
From the starting point of this duality, whether it was due to his multicoloured personality, or simply from his feelings of loneliness, or from every emotion Syd showed to those who knew him personally, we can set off on a journey to immerse ourselves in the lands Syd evokes in our imagination with "Opel", while he searches for someone or something in his own land.
Despite a sinuous cavalcade of chords with complex changes, in ‘Opel’ Syd is trying, finding and giving all at once.
— Julian Palacios, Dark Globe
He would be laughing and telling us a joke one minute and then suddenly go back to his land of never-never.
— Iain "Emo" Moore