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This thread was an awesome read. I was born in '79, I remember being inundated with bands in the early 90's that were getting the "psychedelic" label thrown on them, from the Screaming Trees to Monster Magnet, to what-the-fuck-ever. And I remember being really confused because none of that shit sounded like the Pink Floyd and Beatles records that I had always been told were psychedelic. It wasn't until I got to college that I started getting into krautrock (primarily Can at the time), and finding bootleg Floyd recordings where they would just trance out on a song for an hour that I thought I started to understand the whole altered-consciousness drive of the music. That was also around the time that I started to get into some electronic styles that I thought had a lot in common with those old kraut and Floyd jams. Juno Reactor, for example, definitely puts me in that cool different headspace. You have to really hunt for the electronic stuff because a lot of it is just some lazy shit that some producer sped up and put a Goa Trance label on.

I've never said that any music I've made is psychedelic, but I WOULD if I thought it was going for a similar feel. But that's not the music that's come out of me so far.

retinal orbita wrote:Great thread. Good re-read. I was like "yo I got some opinions on this shit" and then realized I'd already said them.

Making drugs to take music to make drugs to.


I've always been really into psychedelic music, even as a little kid. I think most great jams get into that transcendent state, even if they don't have a drop of 'verb or whatever.

Subsequently, I've always kind of made psychedelic music. It's about the VIBES, MAN.

D.o.S. wrote:... It's about the VIBES, MAN.

A good friend of mine has a purple Harley.

That's not him, though.

It'd be pretty psychedelic if it was.

Seriously guys, those of you who are into teh heavys, check out Ufomammut's last two records

or any of their records, but i think they've outdone themselves on the last two

if we're talking transcendental feelings and psychedelic stuff, I think we shouldn't forget about those - although it's "just" an influence to the heavy thing

What I've heard from their new record I like. Eve was really good.

I just have a bitch of a time finding physical copies in the US for reasonable prices.

wanted to buy the last one on vinyl, it is pretty cheap, but FUCK not-overseas-shipping as expensive as the record itself

To re-rail, Dubs was mentioning volume as a means to bend perceptions, but clearly there is a broader tool kit. At least I'm not aware of Sandy Bull concerts causing ears to bleed. So what else do we have?

Rhythm: Hypnotic rhythm--rave, techno, tribal. Unexpectedly rhythmic variation--trip hop, dnb/breakbeat.
Harmony: dissonance, modulations, non-diatonic adventures.
Pitch: microtonality, bending, octave or beyond displacement.
Manipulation: tape tricks, like directional reverses, speed manipulation, and/or splices. Sampling and it's tricks. DSP. Analog processing, including distortion generation.

You'll notice I put our mission-statement tricks last. Fuzzing out a Shangri Las song isn't necessarily psychedelic, though I'd argue early Jesus and Mary Chain could be fairly psychedelic if not primarily so.

Can you do something right down the middle and have it be psychedelic, though? Can lyrics make something psychedelic on their lonesome?

You just need a joint and a Doors sampler.

D.o.S. wrote:You just need a joint and a Doors sampler.

Looking at something that's essentially an innate quality with the idea for a toolkit seems stupid to me. You can make something with all of those features at once and it won't necessarily be psychedelic.

Example A: Tame Impala. Pop music in a paisley cape.

Psychedelia is all in the mind.

Also Tame Impala blows.

D.o.S. wrote:Looking at something that's essentially an innate quality with the idea for a toolkit seems stupid to me. You can make something with all of those features at once and it won't necessarily be psychedelic.

Example A: Tame Impala. Pop music in a paisley cape.

Point taken on tools being insufficient. However, what do you do to bend minds? Presumably psychedelia is not purely self-executing.

Saying that dirt is dirty because it's dirty doesn't really do anything except advance a tautology. Or elevate debates without agreed terms or understanding that don't really clarify which things are or are not in fact dirty.

I would assume that the underlying quality is an attempt to push at and surprise aesthetic expectations. This is probably why the paisley cape is unimpressive--it's a hand-me-down and not an original thought or expression.