10. Blue Oyster Cult
I have no idea of the extent of the catalogue of the Blue Oyster
Cult, but I can say that “Don’t Fear the Reaper” is one of the best psychedelic
songs ever, and it came out many years after the genre had completely
died. Basically, between 1970 and the
early 90s, “psychedelia” was a forgotten genre which basically meant there wasn’t
anybody trying to freak anyone out. You
had this song, Tom Petty with that “Don’t Come Around Here No More” and of
course Pink Floyd, but even though the 70s were their best decade, their sound
had cleaned up for the most part so nobody was freaking out man. I’m probably over weighing how important “freaking
people out” is to psychedelia, but no, it’s important even though I’m sure the
Blue Oyster Cult never freaked anyone out aside from some Japanese business men
when they saw some karaoke “Godzilla” for the first time.
9. Radiohead
Now we all know no one would label the knob twisters as a “psychedelic”
band by any means, but if you take that “freaking people out” concept, these
guys do it better than most. I’m sure
the contingent of unsuspecting frat guys who were trying to impress the “cool”
girl threw on Kid A or Ok Computer on their own and said to
themselves, “What the fuck?” before shutting it off and decided not to see her
anymore (even though we all know it was the other way around).
To put this in a more personal context, if I was dating when
King of Limbs came out, and the girl I
was interested in liked this album, I would’ve pretended to like it just to get
to know her better, kind of like the time I tried to listen to NKOTB in 1991 to
impress some chick in high school. The girl
listening to the KOL album and me never would’ve worked. I don’t have a clue why anyone would like
that album. IT FREAKS ME OUT! (Well, not really, it’s just boring but in
this case helps illustrate a point possibly not worth making).
8. Ween
People get all People-magazined-out when they hear that J-Lo
breaks up with Russell Crowe or some bullshit, but I tell you, one of the
biggest break-ups I’ve had a tough time with over the past few years was these
two dudes separating.
Ween is responsible for the most diverse catalogue of music
of any band since … well, kind of ever.
Sometimes they’re a little hard to take seriously sure, but they always
had complete control of any genre they were ever digging into (preposition
baby). I know they pass the psychedelia test because
I’ve seen people inhale nitrous oxide to them. If you want a sure fire way to judge if a band
is psychedelic or not, an easy “pass” is if you’ve seen people gas out to
them.
Ween makes you feel like you’re on it already, so if you actually
are on it, while listening to them, it probably has double the effect. My guess is it’d be like a little person on a
helium balloon. That kind of thing.
7. Jefferson Airplane
When the truth is
found, to be lies …
And the hope, within
you dies. Then what?
6. Grateful Dead
Like most bands that came out of San Francisco in the 60s,
the Dead started as nothing more than a psych-band, simply dropping acid,
picking up their instruments and discovering what journeys they could go
on. If you don’t believe this, listen to
either “Drums” or “Space” and you’ll ask me why I didn’t put them #1. Like other bands on this list, they
transcended the genre, but if Garcia were still alive, he’d probably have as
much potential as anyone to freak out the establishment man.
5. Jimi
Perhaps one of the greatest tragedies to Jimi’s timelessness
is he was too psychedelic to the point many of his songs seem like they’re trapped
in the 60s man. (The deeper I go into
this list, the more and more I feel like I’m Tommy Chong while I’m writing
this). Jimi’s generally poor lyrics
focused on colors, freak flags and whatever hippies were doing between 66 and
69. It works against him because well,
he’s possibly the best guitar player of all-time and could suffer the same fate
as Les Paul, meaning nobody today is listening to Les Paul rock it with Mary Ford. It works for him because right now I’m making
a psychedelic list and for that, he’s extremely qualified.
4. The Doors
My generation may be the last to appreciate this band that
didn’t have a bass player. If the
psychedelic movement never happened in the 60s, Jim Morrison never would’ve
happened. Granted, he’s a HUGE reason
for its success. In what other genre can
you say, “Let’s swim to the moon, let’s climb through the tide” and have people
take you seriously. Most of the cool weird
shit from this genre comes from Doors songs, be it Lizard Kings, (whatever that
means), Soft Parades, Strange Days, or strange people freaking you because you’ve
done too much acid. No one had the
success the Doors had with 10 minute opus songs. They opened a lot of … ugh … for many
musicians, and Jimbo’s douchebaggery often lands them as the overrated band of
the 60s, because hell, he’s overrated and Robby Krieger wasn’t that good of a
guitar player. Fact is, the Doors were
one of the best of that time, and that was a very competitive time.
3. The Beatles
Now, these pop singin’ mop tops
are far from a psychedelic band but with the popularity they had, they had the
ease to do Sgt. Pepper and play
sitars in songs and all that crap that no other band’s producers would’ve
allowed in a million years. Long story
short, (this list is getting too long, I can tell already), these guys did
freegin’ Sgt. Pepper so they possibly
deserve to be ranked as high as #1, but I won’t do that. Every band had to have a weird freak out
album after this album came out (see: Rolling Stones, Satanic Majesties Request).
Whether you like it or not, the Beatles were rocks biggest game
changers, and always will be, well unless you count Justin Bieber.
(and I thought Vanilla Ice was a
plumber now).
2.
The Flaming Lips
The reason I write this list is
because today is the day I decided to listen to The Terror on my way to work.
It freaked me out man like
William Miller’s mom. I’m not going to
go into an album review or anything here because well, it’s a complete freak
show. It’s not a surprise or anything
because over the past couple years, I’ve heard things like, “The Flaming Lips
have recorded a 24 hour long song!” and other weird stuff. These guys probably never had it, so I can’t
say they lost it.
That being said, they’re possibly
the greatest psychedelic band of all time.
For starters, this is their 30 year anniversary, though in popularity
terms, they’ve basically only been around since the early 90s (which is still
20 years). No band that’s strictly
played psychedelic music has ever lasted this long and still kept pushing the
boundaries of acid freak-outs. What
Wayne Coyne and his crew have accomplished is astounding.
Whether I enjoy this most current
adventure or not, I enjoy the fact that they always want to take you on one. Almost every album says, “Hey, come along for
the ride, you probably won’t be nearly as sane as you were when we left!”. I love that they do that. No other musicians have the freak out power
that the Lips do. That’s why I love
them. Even when their music approaches
unlistenable.
1.
Pink Floyd
I mean … come on …
(apologies to Frank Zappa fans who
thought he may qualify for this list. I
don’t know him well enough to decipher if he’s psychedelic or just a weirdo).
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