What’s Psychedelic Rock and Why You Should Listen to It
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Psychedelic rock is a subgenre of rock music that emerged during the mid-1960s. Often characterized by distorted guitars, mind-altering lyrics, and extended improvisation, psychedelic rock reached the height of its popularity in the late 1960s. If you’re looking to explore something new, or just want to expand your musical horizons, give psychedelic rock a listen.
Psychedelic Rock Defined
Psychedelic rock, also referred to as “psychedelia”, is a musical style that emerged in the mid-1960s. It’s characterized by its use of feedback, distorted guitars, and mind-altering lyrical content. The aim of psychedelic rock is to create a sensory experience that’s similar to that of a psychedelic drug.
Characteristics of Psychedelic Rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is influenced or inspired by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It often uses new recording techniques and effects, electronic instruments, and elaborately constructed soundscapes.
Psychedelic rock developed in the mid-1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in the United States and the United Kingdom. It reached its height between 1966 and 1969, with bands such as the Beatles, the Beach Boys, Cream, Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix Experience, the Doors, Grateful Dead, Iron Butterfly, Led Zeppelin, Jefferson Airplane, Big Brother and the Holding Company with Janis Joplin, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Sly and the Family Stone, and Country Joe and the Fish.
Notable Psychedelic Rock Bands
Psychedelic rock is a subgenre of rock music that originated in the 1960s and was influenced by psychedelic culture. It reached its peak in the late 1960s and early 1970s with bands such as the Beatles, the Doors, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Cream, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The genre is characterized by distorted guitars, extreme feedback, use of feedback loops, extended solos, and experimental sounds. Psychedelic rock often employs flanging and phasing effects.
Some of the most notable bands in the genre are:
-The Beatles
-The Doors
-Pink Floyd
-Led Zeppelin
-The Jimi Hendrix Experience
-Cream
-Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
The Origins of Psychedelic Rock
Psychedelic rock, also known as mind-bending music, is a type of rock music that incorporates different sounds, effects, and images to create a “trippy” or mind-altering experience. This type of music became popular in the 1960s and 1970s, and it is still popular today. Psychedelic rock is known for its use of different instruments, such as the sitar, and for its effects, such as The Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”
The Beatles
Psychedelic rock, sometimes referred to as “acid rock”, is a style of popular music that was inspired by psychedelic culture and sought to replicate the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. Psychedelic rock often used distorted guitars, tape effects, reverbed vocals, and extended instrumentals to achieve a “trippy” or “cosmic” sound. The genre developed in the mid-1960s and reached its height of popularity in the 1967 Summer of Love.
The Beatles were one of the first and most influential bands to experiment with psychedelic sounds. On their 1966 album Revolver, they utilized innovative production techniques such as backward vocals and tape loops to create a disorienting and otherworldly atmosphere. The album’s iconic cover art, which featured a collage of colorful images, also helped fuel the psychedelic aesthetic. The Beatles’ experimentation with psychedelic sounds laid the groundwork for much of what would come later in the genre.
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones were one of the first and most influential bands to emerge from the British Invasion of the 1960s. The band’s sound was a unique blend of blues, rock, and R&B that helped to define the fledgling genre of psychedelic rock. The Rolling Stones’ 1968 album Beggars Banquet is widely considered to be one of the greatest albums of all time, and it contains some of the band’s most iconic songs, including “Sympathy for the Devil” and “Street Fighting Man.”
The Kinks
The Kinks are an English rock band formed in Muswell Hill, North London, in 1964 by brothers Dave Davies (lead guitar, vocals) and Ray Davies (rhythm guitar, lead vocals). The band’s current lineup includes original member Dave Davies (vocals, lead guitar), longtime bassist Jim Rodford (bass; died 2018), his son Steve Rodford (drums), and guitarist Danny Kotch.
The Kinks have been cited as one of the earliest and most important proto-punk bands. In a 2010 interview with Mojo magazine, Ray Davies said that he felt the group were “one of the first bands to really put fun into pop music,” adding that they were “not trying to change the world… They just wanted to entertain.”
The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. They have received five Grammy nominations but have yet to win an award. In 2018, they were ranked number 26 on VH1’s 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.
Psychedelic Rock in the Present Day
Psychedelic Rock has seen a resurgence in the past few years, with bands like Tame Impala and Temples leading the charge.Psychedelic Rock is a genre of music that is informed by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. The genre emerged in the mid-1960s with the release of The Beatles’ album Revolver and The Beach Boys’ album Pet Sounds.
Tame Impala
Tame Impala is an Australian psychedelic rock band formed in 2007. The group began as a home recording project for frontman Kevin Parker, who writes, records, performs, and produces the band’s music.As of 2019, Tame Impala has released four studio albums: Innerspeaker (2010), Lonerism (2012), Currents (2015), and The Slow Rush (2020). The band has sold more than 10 million albums worldwide.
Tame Impala’s sound has been described as “a medium between ’60s psych pop and ’70s classic rock”; their songs have been called “slabs of grandiose psych-pop”. Parker is the only permanent member of the band; he writes, records, performs, and produces all of Tame Impala’s music. The rest of the band changes from album to album; on three of their four full-length studio albums, different musicians have joined Parker to record and tour with him. Interspeaker was recorded by Parker alone; for Lonerism and Currents, he enlisted the help of other musicians to record with him in studios in France and Australia, respectively. He then mixes and masters all the band’s music himself.
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that emerged in the mid-1960s. Psychedelic rock is characterized by distorted guitars, bleeding-edge production techniques, extended improvised passages, mind-bending lyrics, and an overall experimental approach to music making. Psychedelic rock often incorporates elements of other genres such as acid jazz, electronica, funk, and world music.
If you’re looking for something new to listen to, psychedelic rock is a great genre to explore. With its mix of influences and experimental approach to music making, there’s something for everyone in psychedelic rock.
The Black Keys
The Black Keys are an American rock band formed in Akron, Ohio, in 2001. The group consists of Dan Auerbach (lead vocals, guitar, keyboards) and Patrick Carney (drums). The duo began as an independent act, first releasing their debut album, The Big Come Up, in 2002 on Alive. They gained popularity mainly through word-of-mouth and the internet and released their second album Thickfreakness in 2003. After touring extensively for their first two albums with little success outside Ohio, they focused on creating a more commercial sound that would appeal to a larger audience and released their breakthrough album Brothers in 2010. Their 2011 follow-up El Camino received strong reviews and commercial success; it sold over 1.4 million copies worldwide and received three Grammy Awards,[1][2][3] including awards for Best Rock Album and Best Rock Performance for the single “Lonely Boy”.[4] In 2014, they released their eighth album Turn Blue to critical acclaim.[5] Their ninth album Let’s Rock was released on June 28, 2019.
The Strokes
The Strokes are an American rock band from New York City. Formed in 1998, the group is composed of vocalist Julian Casablancas, lead guitarist Nick Valensi, rhythm guitarist Albert Hammond Jr., bassist Nikolai Fraiture, and drummer Fabrizio Moretti.
After signing with RCA Records and releasing their debut album, Is This It, in 2001, The Strokes achieved commercial success with follow-up albums Room on Fire (2003) and First Impressions of Earth (2006), becoming one of the more popular acts during the garage rock revival of the early 2000s.
