let us now talk about psychedelia

13th Floor Elevators - the first two ("The Psychedelic Sounds of..." and "Easter Everywhere") are garage-psych taken to an extreme. And how many bands have an electric jug player on EVERY song?!?

Zombies - Odyssey and Oracle. A little too fey for me, but some beautiful arrangements, and the "hits" ("Cell 44", "Time of the Season") are quite impressive.

Muddy Waters - Electric Mud. Everybody hates this album, his "acid rock" answer to Hendrix, but I think it's fucking amazing. Blistering even.

The Hollies - their psych albums ('66-'68 or so) albums are uneven, but every one has at least a couple gems on them, and their singles collections are great. Search: "King Midas in Reverse", "Carry-Anne", "Look Through Any Window", "You Need Love". Very Beatle-esque.

Pink Floyd (Syd Barrett era) - it doesn't get anymore psychedelic than this. "See Emily Play", "Apples and Oranges", "Arnold Layne", "Interstellar Overdrive", "Astronomy Domine", "Scream Thy Last Scream" all great. I am especially fond of the non-Syd nugget "Point Me at the Sky" as well.

The Beach Boys - from Pet Sounds through Surf's Up, it's all pretty trippy. But you probably know this.

The Small Faces - "Ogden's Nut Gone Flake" (and various singles from the same period). Hilariously twee cockney interludes on the second side, first side has almost Zeppelin-esque stomp at points ("Afterglow", "Song of a Baker"). Best song is without question "The Universal" - lo-fi psych original for sure. You can hear Mariott's dogs barking and cars going by in the background.

... and the so many more obvious choices from the Who, the Beatles, the Kinks, the Creation, etc. There's loads of this stuff.

And then there are the bands who jumped on the trend and actually made some pretty entertaining records: The Temptations "Psychedelic Shack" and the Rolling Stones "Her Satanic Majesty's Request" are fine examples.

chocolate watch band

west coast pop art experimetnal band

"Notorious Byrd Brothers" by the Byrds is one I'd recommend. I understand some people don't like Graham Parsons or 12-string guitars, that said, this album sounds a lot more like "Tomorrow Never Knows" than Mr. Tambourine Man or their country stuff. Maybe an obvious answer but I avoided the Byrds for years in favor of obscure bullshit like Harvester and was very pleasantly surprised that they didn't completely suck.

The Electric Prunes' albums are worth investigating for what's beyond their classic Nuggets tracks.

Recently uncovered by Sundazed, J.K. & Co.'s Suddenly Last Summer is sort of a lost classic, although more for its sound than the songs. You'll swear it was recorded this year.

Brazilian Tropicalismo, especially Os Mutantes' and Gilberto Gil's first two albums, is as amazing as any US/UK psych of the era.

These suggestions are all wacked out but listenable -
if you're just getting into psych I suggest
you go for the easier to digest stuff,
someone mentioned Zombies and the Small Faces,
those are good too. But I suggest you avoid
stuff like early Pink Floyd or early Grateful
Dead, they are such far out racket that you
might be turned off the genre, go for
the accessible stuff first.

a few favorites:
love _forever changes_
pretty things _s.f. sorrow_
hawkwind _in search of space_
silver apples s/t & _contact_
13th floor elevators _easter everywhere_
michael yonkers band _microminiature love_
early pink floyd
the deep (and the related 'psychedelic moods' comp series)
sam gopal _escalator_ (lemmy...hippie?)
simon finn _pass the distance_
blue cheer _vincebus eruptum_ (not really psych, but essential)

kaleidoscope and july are nice UK popsike.

some of the akarma reissues are killer (twink's _think pink_, le stelle di mario schifano, bodkin), some are spotty (bobby callender _rainbow_, circus 2000) and i'm told some are outright crap.

the nuggets comps are a good place to start - my personal favorite psych comp overall is _beyond the calico wall_.

Defining psych as 1967 onwards post-beat/post-freakbeat (UK) and post-garage (US), I much prefer UK stuff to US. The whole West-coast thing is pretty much a turn off for me.

Avoiding UK freakbeat, although I actually prefer 1965-67 beat/freak (Creation/Koobas/Wimple Winch/Mindbenders/Poets/Dakotas/Chances Are et al)to most UK psych here are some great UK psych records :

Tintern Abbey - Vaccuum Cleaner (67)
The Syn - 14 Hour Technicolour Dream (67)
The Ice - Anniversary Of Love (68)
Pretty Things - Walking Through My Dreams (67)
Virgin Sleep - Secret (68)
Marmalade - Kaliedoscope (70)
The Moving Finger - Pain of mY Misfortune (67)
The Bunch - Looking Glass Alice (67)
Turquoise - Tales Of Flossie Fillet (68)
The End - Shades Of Orange (68)
Aquarian Age - 10,000 Words in A Cardboard Box (68)
JAson Crest - Black Mass (67)
The Living Daylights - Let's Live for Today (68)
Kinsmen - Glasshouse Green Splinter Red (68)
Fairytale - Lovely People (67)

Most of these are from Rubble comps - the absolute best of whiuch is Rubble 6 The Clouds Have Groovy Faces - THE BEST psyche/freakbeat comp ever. Also Rubble 1/2 and 3 are massive.

Of course the Nuggets boxes are essential too. Also looking good is a new series of mainly Pye acts - Psychedelic Pstones - they're up to #2 Haunted now.

Past and Present are doing a decent job of making The Rubble series available, but they need to be on CD. Their CD re-issues are Patchy - That Driving Beat (freakbeat) are good, We Can Fly 1 and 2 are good, but Hen's Teeth (prolly a different company, but distr. by P+P) are shoddy - bad mastering and crap sleevenotes. Avoid Journey Thru Thyme and The Chocolate Soup reissues - get original vinyl.

1) Brit-psych was POP. These bands were not doing what Cream, Led Zep, The Yardbirds, Hendrix were doing. In a way there was a concious opposition to the rock - psych was more playful and *not to be taken too seriously*.

In the US - psych was ROCK - serious, big ideas, a political agenda.

2) It was this way because the UK had a strong Mod and Beat tradition that anchored UK psych with stronger melodies and rhythms.

3) UK psych was seen as a STYLE rather than an integrated movement. Many bands switched to psych overnight in late 67/early 68, and several bands switched in and out. Further than that - bands would throw in one or two psych tracks on an album just to show that they were current. This sense of distance keeps the music fresh, fun and of the moment.

What does anyone think?

I'd go for

West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band - Vol I
West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band - Part II
West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band - A Child's Guide to Good and Evil
Love - Forever Changes
Love - Da Capo
13th Floor Elevators - Easter Everywhere
The Factory - Path Through the Forest

But there are lots of funny, gonzo and inspirational moments on comps like The British Psychedelic Trip 1-3, Nuggets UK/World Box Set. My favorite comp is Acid Dreams I, which is fucking intense, with stuff like Stereo Shoestrings, The Minds Eye and Beautiful Daze, garage punk with brain damaged psych overtones.

I, however, prefer the US stuff:

Search a few I haven't seen dropped yet:

Spirit: 'The Twelve Dreams of Dr Sardonicus'
Bow Street Runners: 'self titled'
Fugs: 'First Album'
Group 1850: 'Agemo's Trip To Mother Earth' (Dutch Loons)
Kaleidoscope (US): Side Trips
Sagittarius: 'Present Tense'
Blues Magoos: 'Psychedelic Lollipop' 'Electric Comic Book'
Peanut Butter Conspiracy: 'The Peanut Butter Conspiracy Is Spreading' 'The Great Conspiracy'
Joe Byrd & Field Hippies: 'The American Metaphysical Circus'

I also can't praise highly enough UK folk/psyche - Fairport and The Pentangle.

"In the US - psych was ROCK - serious, big ideas, a political agenda" -I'm, not sure I buy into that I'm afraid (see The Deviants in the UK). Anyway, US psych had ideas sure, but serious political agendas? More like serious mushroom intake. And most US psych outfits arguably, equally "were not doing what Cream, Led Zep, The Yardbirds, Hendrix were doing". I think I can see where you're going though, and there does seem to be, um, a softer, more... marshmallow, sometimes whimsy, perhaps more comic slant to some of the UK stuff. I dunno man, I geuss I should search out more UK stuff in order to articulate why I prefer the US stuff.

also In japan, it seems only rallizes did something with that form of rock (but i haven't heard everything that japanese bands were coming up with so i might be wrong).

I have to admit that I'm a little shaky on US psych post-66. I'm up to speed on 64-67 garage rock, but I couldn't say that I've ever heard a Jefferson Airplane or Peanut Butter Conspiracy album all the way thru. I like US fop-psyche like Sagitarius/Boettcher and all that lot.

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't saying that nothing got changed cos everyone was loaded, I was rather musing that getting loaded was maybe more important and appreciated by certain of these acts than planting a flag. But the two are intertwined anyway, I mean you can't preach the virtues of experimentation without incurring some sort of political stamp I geuss. Attempting to exist outside a system doesn't mean that you escape the defintion that system applies to you.

re: The Airplane - never kicked it with me either man, not sure why. But the PBC - now they are a great psyche band - search tracks 'It's A Happening Thing', 'The Most Up Till Now', and 'Ecstacy' to convert. Who are your boys/girls on the UK scene?

(I am avoiding this thread, I really am.)

As noted above, just about everything has been mentioned one way or another -- dig up some of the Turkish garage/psych comps, they're great. Both Nuggets boxes very worth owning. And a recent find I'd recommend -- Hapshash and the Coloured Coat, which I'd been wondering about for years because of its mention in Stairway to Hell and found at Terrastock V. That one orange/black coloured album of theirs from 1967 is pretty damn great and among other things invents Amon Duul (I, not II).

Pretty Things - LSD is kind of the opposite. Like the Gamblers song, it mentions LSD but isn't particularly psychedelic.

So are there any UK records where the sound and lyrics came together prior to Tomorrow Never Knows?

Sunshine Superman and the Trip are both pretty lyrically psychedelic (and the latter mentions methedrine)

pretty things' sf sorrow is wayyyyy more psych than their other stuff

def not the first instance tho

Defecting Grey is pretty weird!

Sunshine Superman and the Trip are both pretty lyrically psychedelic (and the latter mentions methedrine)

Oh yeah, and predates Tomorrow Never Knows. Recorded 3 months earlier, released 1 month earlier than TNK. I think The Trip is kind of musically unpsychedelic like the Pretty Things songs, but Sunshine Superman definitely should count.

The Yardbirds had a song called LSD too but I don't know when it was recorded or if it was released at the time.

on the weirdo-surf tip of proto-psych, I think these guys are from the UK -- Ahab and the Wailers from 1963.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6hyGVZail8

first u.s. psych album is this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4oOWbWLRzk

unless you count this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5ODnK2822E

thanking u, scott

i love Alan Watts

but, pace scott, some of Charles Ives' stuff is pretty psych imo

Oh Yardbirds LSD was recorded December '66 but never released until the '90s.

I think The Trip is kind of musically unpsychedelic like the Pretty Things songs, but Sunshine Superman definitely should count.

yeah the Trip is pretty pedestrian musically. but Sunshine Superman has the odd time signature, the harpsichord and that weird Page guitar part

in the u.k. i think this came out right around when "see my friends" came out. 65.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2UNkb-8OjA

does Sunshine Superman predate the various "sunshine" batches of LSD?

that Yardbirds tune sounds somewhere between Gene Pitney and "Ghost Riders in the Sky"

First acid reference is in "19th nervous breakdown" - "On our first trip I tried so hard to rearrange your mind"

does Sunshine Superman predate the various "sunshine" batches of LSD?

pretty sure it was still legal at that point and therefore all sandoz, right?

in the u.k. i think this came out right around when "see my friends" came out. 65.

and they did the fake sitar thing even earlier on Heart Full of Soul.

I digress, but holy crap that Ahab and the Wailers cut is exactly the kind of crazy early 60s exotica/instro music I've been loving the most lately!

pretty sure it was still legal at that point and therefore all sandoz, right?

I dunno when it was declared illegal in the UK but it looks like Owsley wasn't making sunshine until '67...?

harder to find u.k. examples prior to '66. by '66 of course the examples are endless.

I digress, but holy crap that Ahab and the Wailers cut is exactly the kind of crazy early 60s exotica/instro music I've been loving the most lately!

yeah, that song is amazing! a thread of that sort of thing would be great.

when did the fugs start making psychedelic music?

not an answer but Bond definitely influenced psych in the UK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoQG9wN0mAk

when did the fugs start making psychedelic music?

fugs were more about the coke/heroin/speed references, no?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Akc_Gn0RwU

sorry i'm just youtubing stuff i like now

fugs were more about the coke/heroin/speed references, no?

i guess i couldn't get high etc was but things like virgin forest sound like psychedelia to me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKdZIb522fE&feature=related

Fugs = American

also irritating

oh man searching UK Psych on youtube pulls up some awesome shit

Fugs = American

ya don't say

Happening Ten Years Time Ago = the UK Eight Miles High

it was released in oct 1966, two months after Revolver so it doesnt predate Tomorrow Never Knows (tho Roger the Engineer does), but as far as singles go, that's probably the one I'd pick

I remember a couple years ago I wanted to create some sort of fake zine that took place in 1966-7 that was kind of like SPIN magazine, trying to recreate the far-out lingo while taking sort of an ex post facto view towards the music scene--talking not just about beat music heroes like the Byrds and Yardbirds and the Elevators and Love, but also primitive folk stuff like John Fahey and Robbie Basho, and a bunch of stuff no one was listening to back then ("...we've been hearing wild things about this combo in Germany called the Monks!")

It was fun to think about, but I easily accepted that particular project as doomed to never be fulfilled.

Why would you accept "happenings" but not Shapes of Things from 8 months earlier?

inclined to pin the winning badge on Donovan if it wasn't for the UK delay of that single... when did Page join the Yardbirds? interesting that he's connected to these original UK psych stirrings

trips and sugar cubes in hey gyp lyrics. 1965.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RwE7M9IrWg

b-side to a 1965 single. to be exact.

Most of the best psychedelic yardbirds stuff is pre-Page. Happenings is the first song he played on.

haha, this page talks about almost everything we've gone over in this thread http://www.lysergia.com/LamaWorkshop/lamaEarlyPsychedelia.htm

ooh nice find Scott! I didn't know that one. I do love me some Donovan. not very psych-sounding tho

Whoops my bad on Shapes. I thought that might have been later for some reason. Also: I can't believe I forgot about 'Rain' (even though 'Shapes' still might be earlier). I don't even know who I am anymore.*

*title of an Electric Prunes outtake

Yeah to me, the lyrics of "Shapes" seem to be pretty obviously acid inspired, even if they don't explicitly namecheck sugar cubes or something. And "Rain" doesn't seem any more psychedelic than a song like Heart Full of Soul that came out a full year earlier.

I disagre: "When it rains or shines/it's just a state of mind" nails the subjective nature of reality theme that is def the result of LSD experimentation. Plus the innovative backwards coda.

Anyone have an opinion about this? "Love Poetry And Revolution", a new 3CD UK psych comp from Cherry Red: http://www.cherryred.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=4460

Haha not only do I have an opinion...

http://thequietus.com/articles/14072-love-poetry-and-revolution-review

some v cool stuff on there but i would have preferred they leave off the previously (and in some cases quite heavily) comped stuff and make it a disc shorter

has anyone into this stuff not heard magic potion by now?

nice to see complex on there, images blue in my top 10 tracks of the 70s

Aw Ned, I set that self-promotion up for you! Well done.

I'm on the fence about these sorts of things. I dig Nuggets II and Mojo's Acid Drops box sets but I'm not sure I need another. Having said that, any compiler smart enough to include Bill Nelson has my attention.