Acid Fuzz Rock

This year marks the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, one of the most famous festivals for 60s psychedelic rock music. That was 1969, so what came next? Psychedelic rock went off in a few directions during the 70s.

One was towards proggy "jam sessions" fueled by who knows what (e.g. Grateful Dead, etc). I generally found that branch a little boring but prog music was still interesting because it broke down a lot of common rock structures. Next came the psychedelic metal: The Gun, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, etc. Another prog sound developed where heavily acid driven bands like The Flock started using horns, flutes, violins, and anything they could think of to sound more "out there." If you ignore the ridiculous circus song that for some reason was obligatory on every one of these band's LPs then this made for some pretty interesting landscapes: the kind of song where halfway through it you are no longer sure what time it is or what you've been doing for the past 20 minutes and you wonder why the room suddenly seems larger. Then there was the softer folk branch, the jazz and R&B crossovers, et cetera.

Here's a little comp I put together that samples a few different directions that psychedelic rock went in the late 60s and early 70s. Enjoy!

Yours, DJ Bylamplight.

download zip of mp3s

Track listing:

Lighthouse -- The Flock
Suite in C -- McDonald & Giles
Sma Lätta Moln -- Pugh
Hole In My Pocket -- The Barry Goldberg Reunion
That's Life -- Nektar
Rytm Ziemi -- Czerwone Gitary
Coda -- Czerwone Gitary
It Won't Be Long (Heartbeat) -- The Gun
Suite Delirium -- Puzzle
Leo Rising -- Ronnie Montrose
I'm a Man -- The Serfs
Trillium -- The Youngbloods


P.S. Check out Phrock's Woodstock tribute for more psychedelia.

(cover photo by Christian Javan)