Who played the kazoo and trumpet on Pink Floyd's 'Corporal Clegg' — and why a war song sounds so silly

The kazoo solo on “Corporal Clegg” was played by David Gilmour, blowing into a toy kazoo through a cardboard tube to warp the sound. The trumpet parts were handled by Norman Smith, the band’s producer at the time (and former Beatles engineer), who also lent the song its off-key, almost vaudevillian brass. The whole thing was deliberate: the band wanted a cartoonish, music-hall feel to undercut the grim subject of a shell-shocked World War II soldier with a wooden leg, making the absurdity of war itself the punchline.

Syd Barrett’s influence still hovered over A Saucerful of Secrets, and he loved mixing dark themes with playground instrumentation — think “The Gnome” or “Bike.” The military drumbeat was played by Nick Mason, but instead of a thunderous march, it’s stiff and tinny, like a toy soldier’s parade. The result is a song that sounds less like protest and more like a broken music box, which was exactly the point: war is ridiculous, and so is Corporal Clegg.