Psychedelic Rock
Psychedelic Rock
Psychedelic Rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or inuenced by psychedelic culture and attempts
to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of
psychedelic drugs. It often uses new recording techniques
and eects and sometimes draws on sources such as the
ragas and drones of Indian music.
It was pioneered by musicians including the Beatles, the
Beach Boys, the Byrds, and the Yardbirds, emerging as a
genre during the mid-1960s among folk rock and blues
rock bands in the United Kingdom and United States,
such as Grateful Dead, Jeerson Airplane, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Cream, the Doors and Pink Floyd. It
reached a peak in between 1967 and 1969 with the
Summer of Love and Woodstock Rock Festival, respectively, becoming an international musical movement and
associated with a widespread counterculture, before beginning a decline as changing attitudes, the loss of some
key individuals and a back-to-basics movement, led surviving performers to move into new musical areas.
Psychedelic rock inuenced the creation of psychedelic
pop and psychedelic soul. It also bridged the transition from early blues- and folk music-based rock to
progressive rock, glam rock, hard rock and as a result
inuenced the development of subgenres such as heavy
metal. Since the late 1970s it has been revived in various
forms of neo-psychedelia.
Characteristics
As a musical style, psychedelic rock attempted to replicate the eects of and enhance the mind-altering experiences of hallucinogenic drugs, incorporating new electronic and recording eects, extended solos, and improvisation, and it was particularly inuenced by eastern mys- A sitar, much used on early records of the genre.
ticism, reected in use of exotic instrumentation, particularly from Indian music or the incorporation of elements
a strong keyboard presence, especially organs,
of eastern music. Major features include:
harpsichords, or the Mellotron (an early tape-driven
'sampler');[4]
electric guitars, often used with feedback, wah wah
and fuzzboxes;[1]
extended instrumental solos or jams;[5]
elaborate studio eects, such as backwards tapes,
panning, phasing, long delay loops, and extreme
reverb;[2]
non-Western instruments, specically those originally used in Indian classical music such as the sitar
and tabla ;[3]
HISTORY
Etymology
3
3.1
History
Origins
3.2
3
who had also electried to produce his own brand of folk
rock, released "Rainy Day Women 12 & 35", with its
repeating chorus of Everybody must get stoned!".[37]
In Britain, the Yardbirds, with Je Beck as their guitarist,
increasingly moved into psychedelic territory, adding uptempo improvised rave ups, Gregorian chant and world
music (in particular Indian) inuences to their songs, including Still I'm Sad (1965) and "Over Under Sideways
Down" (1966), and singles such as "Heart Full of Soul"
(1965), "Shapes of Things" (1966) and "Happenings Ten
Years Time Ago" (1966).[28][38][39] They were soon followed by bands such as Procol Harum, The Moody Blues
and The Nice.[40]
clubs, coee houses and independent radio stations catering to a population of students at nearby Berkeley, and
to free thinkers that had gravitated to the city.[31] From
1964, the Merry Pranksters, a loose group that developed
around novelist Ken Kesey, sponsored the Acid Tests, a
series of events based around the taking of LSD (supplied by Stanley), accompanied by light shows, lm projection and discordant, improvised music known as the
psychedelic symphony.[32][33] The Pranksters helped popularize LSD use through their road trips across America
in a psychedelically-decorated school bus, which involved
distributing the drug and meeting with major gures of
the beat movement, and through publications about their
activities such as Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid
Test (1968).[26]
The Byrds, emerging from the Californian folk scene,
and the Yardbirds from the British blues scene, have
been seen as particularly inuential on the development
of the genre.[10] Drug use and attempts at psychedelic
music moved out of acoustic folk-based music towards
rock soon after The Byrds plugged in to produce a
chart topping version of Dylans Mr. Tambourine Man
in the summer of 1965, which became a folk rock
standard.[34][35][36]
A number of Californian-based folk acts followed them
into folk-rock, bringing their psychedelic inuences with
them, to produce the "San Francisco Sound".[10][32] Particularly prominent products of the scene were The
Grateful Dead (who had eectively become the house
band of the Acid Tests),[33] Country Joe and the Fish,
The Great Society, Big Brother and the Holding Company, The Charlatans, Moby Grape, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Jeerson Airplane.[10] In 1966, The
Byrds moved rapidly away from folk rock with their single "Eight Miles High", which made use of free jazz and
Indian ragas, and the lyrics of which were widely taken to
refer to drug use.[10] The result of this directness was limited airplay, and there was a similar reaction when Dylan,
HISTORY
where the major rock artists, from both the US and the wild shirts from shops like Mr Fish, Granny Takes a Trip
UK, came to play.[44]
and old military uniforms from Carnaby Street (Soho)
[55]
Although San Francisco was the centre of American and Kings Road (Chelsea) boutiques.
psychedelic music scene, many other American cities
contributed signicantly to the new genre. The rst
psychedelic single to reach the US top 10 was "Psychotic
Reaction" by San Jose garage band Count Five in
July 1966.[8] Los Angeles boasted dozens of important psychedelic bands. Besides The Byrds, these included Iron Buttery, Love, Spirit, Captain Beefheart
and his Magic Band, The United States of America, The
West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, and the Electric
Prunes;[45] perhaps the most commercially successful
were The Doors.[46] Frank Zappa and his group The
Mothers of Invention began to incorporate psychedelic
inuences in their rst two albums Freak Out! (1966)
and Absolutely Free (1967).[47]
New York City produced its share of psychedelic bands,
such as folk pioneers The Fugs, The Godz, and Pearls
Before Swine, besides the Blues Magoos, the Blues
Project,[48] Lothar and the Hand People[49] and the bluesinuenced Vanilla Fudge.[50] The Detroit area gave rise
to psychedelic bands the Amboy Dukes, and the SRC,[51]
and Chicago produced H. P. Lovecraft.[52] Texas (particularly Austin) is often cited for its contributions to
psychedelic music: besides the 13th Floor Elevators it
produced acts including Bubble Puppy, Lost and Found,
The Golden Dawn, The Zakary Thaks, and Red Crayola.[53]
3.3
Development in the UK
3.5
International expansion
3.4
Peak years
5
In America the Summer of Love of 1967 saw a huge
number of young people from across America and the
world travel to the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, boosting the population from 15,000 to around
100,000.[75] It was prefaced by the Human Be-In event
in March and reached its peak at the Monterey Pop Festival in June, the latter helping to make major American
stars of Janis Joplin, lead singer of Big Brother and the
Holding Company, Jimi Hendrix and The Who.[76] Key
recordings included Jeerson Airplanes Surrealistic Pillow, the rst album to come out of San Francisco during
this era, which sold well enough to bring the citys music
scene to the attention of the record industry: from it they
took two of the earliest psychedelic hit singles: "White
Rabbit" (1967) and "Somebody to Love" (1967).[77] The
Doors' rst hit single "Light My Fire" (1967), running for
over seven minutes, became one of the dening records
of the genre, although their follow up album Strange Days
only enjoyed moderate success.[78] Santana, led by guitarist Carlos Santana, used Latin rhythms as the basis for
their psychedelic music.[8]
HISTORY
3.6 Decline
By the end of the 1960s, psychedelic rock was in retreat. LSD had been made illegal in the US and UK
in 1966.[99] In 1969, the murders of Sharon Tate and
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca by Charles Manson and
his family of followers, claiming to have been inspired
by Beatles songs such as "Helter Skelter", has been seen
as contributing to an anti-hippie backlash.[100] At the end
of the same year, the Altamont Free Concert in California, headlined by the Rolling Stones, became notorious for the fatal stabbing of black teenager Meredith
Hunter by Hells Angel security guards.[101] Brian Wilson
of the Beach Boys (whose much anticipated Smile project
would not emerge until 2004),[102][103] Brian Jones of the
Rolling Stones, Peter Green of Fleetwood Mac and Syd
Barrett of Pink Floyd were early acid casualties, helping to shift the focus of the respective bands of which they
had been leading gures.[104] Some groups, such as the
Jimi Hendrix Experience and Cream, broke up.[105] Jimi
Hendrix died in London in September 1970, shortly after recording Band of Gypsys (1970), Janis Joplin died of
a heroin overdose in October 1970 and they were closely
followed by Jim Morrison of the Doors, who died in Paris
in July 1971.[106] Many surviving acts moved away from
psychedelia into either more back-to-basics "roots rock",
7
traditional-based, pastoral or whimsical folk, the wider turning away from American-inuenced folk rock toward
experimentation of progressive rock, or ri-based heavy a sound based on traditional British music and founding
rock.[10]
the subgenre of electric folk, to be followed by bands
like Steeleye Span and Fotheringay.[113] The psychedelicinuenced and whimsical strand of British folk continued
into the 1970s with acts including Comus, Mellow Candle, Nick Drake, The Incredible String Band, Forest and
Trees and with Syd Barretts two solo albums.[114]
4 Inuence
4.1 Other genres
Main articles: Psychedelic pop and Psychedelic soul
As psychedelia emerged as a mainstream and commer-
In 1966, even while psychedelic rock was becoming dominant, Bob Dylan spearheaded the back-to-basics roots
revival when he went to Nashville to record the album
Blonde on Blonde.[107][108] This, and the subsequent more
clearly country-inuenced albums, John Wesley Harding
(1967) and Nashville Skyline (1969), have been seen as
creating the genre of country folk.[108] Dylans lead was
also followed by The Byrds, joined by Gram Parsons to
record Sweetheart of the Rodeo (1968), helping to dene
the genre of country rock,[109] which became a particularly popular style in the California music scene of the
late 1960s, and was adopted by former folk rock artists including Hearts and Flowers, Poco and New Riders of the
Purple Sage.[109] Other acts that followed the back to basics trend in dierent ways were the Canadian group The
Band and the Californian-based Creedence Clearwater
Revival.[110] The Grateful Dead also had major successes
with the more reective and stripped back Workingmans
Dead and American Beauty in 1970.[111] The super-group
Crosby, Stills and Nash, formed in 1968 from members of The Byrds, Bualo Springeld, and The Hollies,
were joined by Neil Young for Deja Vu in 1970, which
moved away from many of what had become the clichs
of psychedelic rock and placed an emphasis on political
commentary and vocal harmonies.[112]
5 NEO-PSYCHEDELIA
4.2
Rock music
5 Neo-psychedelia
Main article: Neo-psychedelia
9
bands.[137] Psychedelic rock began to be revived in the
late 1970s/early 1980s by bands of the post-punk scene,
including the work of The Teardrop Explodes, Echo
and the Bunnymen, The Church, the Soft Boys,[137]
Siouxsie and the Banshees,[138][139] The Cure,[140] The
Glove,[141] and The Legendary Pink Dots.[142] In the
US in the early 1980s these bands were joined by the
Paisley Underground movement, based in Los Angeles, with acts like Dream Syndicate, The Bangles and
Rain Parade.[143] New wave band XTC published records
under the pseudonym The Dukes of Stratosphear from
1985.[144] Even Gothic rock band The Damned incorporated psychedelic music into their sound.[145] The
late 1980s saw the birth of shoegazing in the UK,
which, among other inuences, took inspiration from
1960s psychedelia.[146] Critic Simon Reynolds described
this movement as a rash of blurry, neo-psychedelic
bands.[146] With loud walls of sound, where individual
instruments and even vocals were often indistinguishable,
they followed the lead of noise pop and dream pop bands
such as My Bloody Valentine (often considered as the earliest shoegaze act),[147] The Jesus and Mary Chain, and
the Cocteau Twins.[148] Major acts included Ride, Lush,
Chapterhouse, and The Boo Radleys, who enjoyed considerable attention in the UK, but largely failed to break
through in the US.[149]
5.2
6 See also
List of electric blues musicians
List of psychedelic rock artists
7 Notes
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14
7 NOTES
15
8.1
Text
8.2
Images
16
8.3
Content license