Nu Psych: The new age of psychedelic music
BELIEVE it or not, there’s a new age of psychedelic music upon us. Not so much the re-dawning of the age of Aquarius, but rather, a bunch of snotty brats all making experimental pop-music without the need to badger you about some awful political cause.
This is music made to frazzle your brains, rattle your eyes and shake your arse.
And it isn’t just ’60s revivalism either – these bands have managed to capture the ’60s counter culture’s lightning in a bottle, but mixed it up with meths and cough syrup, to make music that can veer wildly from inyerface hooligan garage rock, to Super 8 sunshine jangly pop, to cosmic prog-pop.
Yeah. Prog-pop. That’s definitely a thing now.
And there’s festivals cropping up all over the place, with Manchester’s Psychedelic Fest, and the bigger, spacier Liverpool Psych Fest.
The latter is a MUST for fans of gonzo pop music.
With that, there’s only one thing left to do – enjoy the music. There’s a lot of crate digging to be done and this list is a snapshot, rather than an exhaustive look at the new psychedelic scene, but rest assured, once you get stuck into this lot, you’ll be disappearing down internet worm-holes all night, finding all the newest and bug-eyed bands around.
Gulp
Guto from SFA and Lindsay Leven join forces to make fuzzy, sunshine psych with a vaguely sinister edge and a load of battered keyboards.
Fat White Family
If you saw Fat White Family’s show at Glastonbury, you’ll know that this band are on self-destruct. The contempt for the audience is only bettered by their contempt for each other. They stink. They’re great. They look like they might not make it through their own sets, but somehow, they do.
Buffalo Killers
Big, hairy power trio, Buffalo Killers have a clutch of excellent LPs under their belts, combining dreamy harmonies over muscular, sexy riffs.
Wolf People
WP mix drone folk with booming prog and mix it with pop to make one helluva racket. They throw everything including the kitchen sink (still filled with pots) at their music. Yes please!
Mazes
Switching between komische, 90s stoner rock and psych, Mazes are a fun, schizophrenic outfit with two absolutely killer LPs already on the shelves. Tense, punchy and one of the bands you should definitely catch on the circuit.
Goat
How do you describe Goat? Well, their approach to music isn’t like most other bands. They’re the sound of every experimental rock record you own being tipped into a blender and then poured directly into your brain through the funnel that someone jammed through your skull. And if you’re not into that, you may as well shuffle off and die.
Stealing Sheep
With elements of Pentangle, United States Of America and Stereolab, Stealing Sheep are one of the most irresistible bands in the UK right now.
Woods
If Buffalo Springfield recorded everything in a shed and replaced in-fighting for bottles of cheap red wine, you might end up with something like Woods.
Quilt
If you like more introspective, weird psychedelic music that stumbles the line between The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band and the dimly lit, mellower moments of the Velvet Underground, then Quilt are the band for you. And they’re fucking magnificent.
September Girls
Dublin’s September Girls are icily cool and dead-eyed in their approach to psych. Less ‘happening in a field’ and more ‘potential riot in an abandoned factory unit’. Echoes of Jesus & Mary Chain clatter into dreamy, popsike vocals. What’s not to love?
Temple Songs
For those of you who like their psychedelic music clinging on by the fingernails, Temple Songs brand of druggy punk-psych are just the ticket. Noisy garage grot to make you get up out of your seat and spill your drink all over yourself.
Posted: 24th, July 2014 | In: Music Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
