V.A: This Is Psychedelia. Over 3 Hours Of Mind - Expanding Acid Rock 2007

Psychedelia refers to psychedelic art, psychedelic music and the subculture that originated in the psychedelic experience of the 1960s, by people who used psychedelic drugs such as LSD, mescaline (found in peyote) and psilocybin (found in magic mushrooms).

 
Psychedelic art and music typically recreate or reflect the experience of altered consciousness.

Psychedelic art uses highly distorted, surreal visuals, bright colors and full spectrums and animation (including cartoons) to evoke, convey, or enhance the psychedelic experience. Psychedelic music uses distorted electric guitar, Indian music elements such as the sitar, tabla, electronic effects, sound effects and reverberation, and elaborate studio effects, such as playing tapes backwards or panning the music from one side to another.

The term psychedelic is derived from the Greek words ψυχή (psyche, "soul, mind") and δηλείν (delein, "to manifest"), hence "mind manifesting", the implication being that psychedelics can

develop unused potentials of the human mind. The word was coined in 1956 by British psychiatrist, Humphry Osmond, the spelling loathed by American ethnobotanist Richard Schultes, but championed by the American psychologist, Timothy Leary.

Aldous Huxley had suggested to Humphry Osmond in 1956 his own coinage phanerothyme (Greek phaneroein- "visible" and Greek thymos "soul", thus "visible soul"). Recently, the term entheogenic has come into use to denote the use of psychedelic drugs in a religious, spiritual, and mystical context.

The psychedelic movement of the 1960s imprinted a kaleidoscopic stamp on musical cultures from

across the globe, from the Tropic artists in Brazil to the Afrobeat groups in West Africa and even the legendary Bollywood composers. Carefully selected from albums in the Rough Guide Psychedelic series, these mind-bending, rebellious and deeply cool grooves create a heady psychedelic brew which is guaranteed to open up new musical doors.
In the minds of most people, the psychedelic era lasted just a few short (though eventful and multi-coloured) years.

As the Beat Generation of Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg morphed into an LSD culture inspired by the writings of Timothy Leary and Aldous Huxley, bands like the Holy Modal

Rounders and the Incredible String Band opened their minds not only to hallucinogens but to the sounds of Indian drones and middle-eastern musical modes. Soon everyone from the Yardbirds to the Monkees were using distortion, reverb and taped sounds played backwards or looped to create new rhythms and textures. But as flower power wilted, Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin died young, rock bands became pompous or progressive and pop groups discovered platform heels and glitter.

Psychedelic rock, also referred to as psychedelia, is a diverse style of rock music inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelic culture, which is centred on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music is intended to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs, most notably LSD. Many psychedelic groups differ in style, and the label is often applied spuriously.

Originating in the mid-1960s among British and American musicians, the sound of psychedelic rock invokes three core effects of LSD: depersonalization, dechronicization, and dynamization, all of

which detach the user from reality. Musically, the effects may be represented via novelty studio tricks, electronic or non-Western instrumentation, disjunctive song structures, and extended instrumental segments. Some of the earlier 1960s psychedelic rock musicians were based in folk, jazz, and the blues, while others showcased an explicit Indian classical influence called "raga rock." In the 1960s, there existed two main variants of the genre: the whimsical British pop-psychedelia and the harder American West Coast acid rock. While "acid rock" is sometimes deployed interchangeably with the term "psychedelic rock," it also refers more specifically to the heavier and more extreme ends of the genre.

The peak years of psychedelic rock were between 1967 and 1969, with milestone events including the 1967 Summer of Love and the 1969 Woodstock Rock Festival, becoming an international musical

movement 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. The genre bridged the transition from early blues and folk-based rock to progressive rock and hard rock, and as a result contributed to the development of sub-genres such as heavy metal. Since the late 1970s it has been revived in various forms of neo-psychedelia.

This Rough Guide reflects many aspects of the global psychedelic sphere, not only from the sixties, but continuing through the decades and on into the 21st century.

During the 1970s drug culture wasn't flooding India's shores but the country was undergoing its own social transformation and a DIY garage band scene evolved.
1967 was when psychedelic rock received widespread media attention and a larger audience beyond local psychedelic communities. From 1967 to 1968, psychedelic rock was the prevailing sound of rock music, either in the whimsical British variant, or the harder American West Coast acid rock. Since most of the US acts had yet to release records in the UK, most of the British groups based their sound on what they'd simply read or heard about psychedelic music.

Compared with American psychedelia, British psychedelic music was often more arty in its experimentation, and it tended to stick within pop song structures. In February 1967, the Beatles released the double A-side single "Strawberry Fields Forever" / "Penny Lane", which Ian MacDonald

says launched both the "English pop-pastoral mood" typified by bands such as Pink Floyd, Family, Traffic and Fairport Convention, and English psychedelia's LSD-inspired preoccupation with "nostalgia for the innocent vision of a child". According to Simonelli, the Beatles' single heralded the group's brand of Romanticism as a central tenet of psychedelic rock. Pink Floyd's "Arnold Layne" (March 1967) and "See Emily Play" (June 1967), both written by Syd Barrett, helped set the pattern for British pop-psychedelia.

Jefferson Airplane's Surrealistic Pillow (February 1967) was the first album to come out of San Francisco during this era, which sold well enough to bring the city's music scene to the attention of the record industry: from it they took two of the earliest[contradictory] psychedelic hit singles:

"White Rabbit" and "Somebody to Love". Soon, British clubs like the UFO Club, Middle Earth Club, The Roundhouse, the Country Club and the Art Lab were drawing capacity audiences with psychedelic rock and ground-breaking liquid light shows. A major figure in the development of British psychedelia was the American promoter and record producer Joe Boyd, who moved to London in 1966. He co-founded venues including the UFO Club, produced Pink Floyd's first single, "Arnold Layne", and went on to manage folk and folk rock acts including Nick Drake, the Incredible String Band and Fairport Convention.

[ AllMusic Review by Jeff Tamarkin 

The year 2007, being the 40th anniversary of the so-called Summer of Love, saw no shortage of new compilations and boxed sets attempting to encapsulate the music that defined the subgenre of that era

and has since come to be called psychedelic (no self-respecting hippie would have called it that at the time). Several have done a fine job doing just that, while others have been off the mark, either including music from other time periods or music that could, under no circumstances, fall under the banner of psychedelic.

This three-disc British box straddles a fine line between accomplishing what it sets out to do -- its subtitle, "Over 3 hours of mind-expanding acid rock" puts its goal into clearer perspective -- and teetering into that latter category. On the plus side, it includes key tracks from well-known bands both from America and Britain, among them Jefferson Airplane, Moby Grape, the Velvet Underground, Eric Burdon & the Animals, It's a Beautiful Day, Spirit, the Byrds, Status Quo, Strawberry Alarm Clock, the Nice, 13th Floor Elevators, the Small Faces, and the Yardbirds, all of which could legitimately be considered essential psych.

It also takes chances by tucking in tracks by bands of lesser renown that should have made more of a splash than they did, at least for the the Smoke ("My Friend Jack"), Kak ("Lemonaide Kid"), the Blues Magoos (their sole huge hit, "We Ain't Got Nothin' Yet") and Fleur de Lys ("Circles"). It's debatable whether the Youngbloods' excellent "Darkness, Darkness" or Kenny Rogers & the First Edition's "Just Dropped In" actually qualify as psychedelia, and almost ludicrous that glam pioneer Marc Bolan is included here (although the track, "Misfit," does have stylistic consistencies with some of the better true psych).
 

Several other tracks are obscure enough to have made it to the sub-Nuggets compilations that flourished in the '80s: (the Purple's "Granny Takes a Trip," the Glass Menagerie's take on the Rolling Stones' "She's a Rainbow") are welcome additions here, keeping things interesting. Of course there's a lot missing that qualified as genuine psychedelia, but as an overall intro to the phenomenon, this set, while not perfect, covers enough ground to get a thumbs up as one of those that knows what it's talking about.]

As a musical style, psychedelic rock attempts to replicate the effects of and enhance the mind-altering experiences of hallucinogenic drugs, incorporating new electronic sound effects and recording effects, extended solos, and improvisation.

Various ‎– This Is Psychedelia

Label: Metro Triples ‎– METRTCD827

Format: 3 × CD, Compilation Box Set

Country: UK

Released: 11 Jun 2007

Genre: Rock

Style: Psychedelic Rock

TRACKS

DISC 1.

01. Jefferson Airplane - White Rabbit 2:36

02. Small Faces - Itchycoo Park 2:49

03. Strawberry Alarm Clock - Incense and Peppermints 2:49

04. Yardbirds - Shapes of Things 2:27

05. The Mooche - Hot Smoke & Sassafras 3:12

06. The Byrds - Eight Miles High 3:39

07. The Purple Gang - Granny Takes a Trip 2:36

08. The 13th Floor Elevators - Slip Inside this House 8:03

09. Status Quo - Pictures of Matchstick Men 3:09

10. The Velvet Underground - Venus in Furs 5:12

11. The Glass Menagerie - She's a Rainbow 2:21

12. Kaleidoscope - Keep Your Mind Open 2:18

13. Les Fleur de Lys - Circles 3:04

14. Velvett Fogg - Yellow Cave Woman 6:57

15. H.P. Lovecraft - Electrallentando 6:41

MP3 @ 320 Size: 139 MB
FLAC  Size: 328 MB

DISC 2.

01. Spirit - Fresh Garbage 3:16

02. The Animals - Sky Pilot 7:31

03. The First Edition - Just Dropped In (To See What Condition my Condition Was In) 3:21

04. Honeybus - Under the Silent Tree 4:02

05. Moby Grape - Hey Grandma 2:32

06. Marc Bolan - Misfit 1:54

07. Blonde on Blonde - Spinning Wheel 2:46

08. Kak - Lemonaide Kid 5:57

09. Nirvana - Rainbow Chaser 2:37

10. Peter Thorogood - Haunted 3:14

11. West Coast Consortium - Colour Sergeant Lillywhite 3:08

12. The Orange Machine - Real Life Permanent Dream 3:17

13. The Poets - Locked in a Room 3:03

14. Man - Sudden Life 4:28

15. Status Quo - Mr Mind Detector 4:04

16. Onyx - Tamaris Khan 2:53

MP3 @ 320 Size: 139 MB
FLAC  Size: 352 MB

DISC 3.

01. It's a Beautiful Day - White Bird 6:09

02. The Nice - Flower King Of Flies 3:20

03. The Youngbloods - Darkness, Darkness 3:51

04. Small Faces - Long Agos and Worlds Apart 2:37

05. Blues Magoos - (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet 2:18

06. Status Quo - You're Just What I Was Looking for Today 3:49

07. The Smoke - My Friend Jack 3:15

08. The Searchers - Crazy Dreams 2:37

09. The Orange Seaweed - Pictures in the Sky 3:03

10. Pussy - The Open Ground 3:36

11. The Bystanders - Cave of Clear Light 3:44

12. Nico - Little Sister 4:27

13. Episode Six - I Can See Through You 3:26

14. The Rockin' Berries - Yellow Rainbow 2:49

15. The New Formula - Stay Indoors 4:16

16. The Tremeloes - Suddenly Winter 2:24

MP3 @ 320 Size: 134 MB
FLAC  Size: 303 MB

THE ANIMALS: SKY PILOT LYRICS

He blesses the boys as they stand in line

The smell of gun grease

and the bayonets they shine

He's there to help them all that he can

To make them feel wanted he's a good holy man

Sky pilot,

Sky pilot,

How high can you fly?

You'll never, never, never reach the sky.

He smiles at the young soldiers

Tells them it's all right

He knows of their fear in the forthcoming fight

Soon there'll be blood and many will die

Mothers and fathers back home they will cry

Sky pilot,

Sky pilot,

How high can you fly?

You'll never, never, never reach the sky.

He mumbles a prayer and it ends with a smile

The order is given

They move down the line

But he'll stay behind and he'll meditate

But it won't stop the bleeding or ease the hate

As the young men move out into the battle zone

He feels good, with God you're never alone

He feels tired and he lays on his bed

Hopes the men will find courage

in the words that he said

Sky pilot,

Sky pilot,

How high can you fly?

You'll never, never, never reach the sky.

You're soldiers of God, you must understand

The fate of your country is in your young hands

May God give you strength

Do your job real well

If it all was worth it

Only time it will tell

In the morning they return

With tears in their eyes

The stench of death drifts up to the skies

A soldier so ill looks at the sky pilot

Remembers the words

"Thou shalt not kill."

Sky pilot,

Sky pilot,

How high can you fly?

You'll never, never, never reach the sky.