Syd Barrett's Zippo Lighter Slide on 'Interstellar Overdrive'

Syd Barrett didn’t just play guitar on “Interstellar Overdrive” — he turned a cheap Zippo lighter into his signature slide, scraping it against the strings of a Danelectro 3021. The lighter gave a thin, metallic clatter you can’t get from a glass or metal slide, especially when he pressed it hard against the fretboard while the Binson Echorec sent the sound spinning into a delay haze.

The unusual sound also came from the way Barrett worked the echo unit live. He’d crank the feedback knob on the Echorec until the repeats collapsed into a self-oscillating howl, then ride the volume knob on his guitar to control the chaos. That combination — a cigarette lighter as a slide, a cheap guitar, and a tape echo pushed to its breaking point — created the lurching, seasick riff that still sounds like nothing else.