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Psychedelic music (sometimes psychedelia) covers a range of popular music styles and genres, which are inspired by or influenced by psychedelic culture and which attempt to replicate and/or enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid-1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in the United States and Britain.
Psychedelic music bands often used new recording techniques and effects and drew on non-Western sources such as the ragas and drones of Indian music. Psychedelic influences spread into folk, rock, and soul, creating the subgenres of psychedelic folk, psychedelic rock, psychedelic pop and psychedelic soul in the late 1960s before declining in the early 1970s. Psychedelic music bands expanded their musical horizons, and went on to create and influence many new musical genres including progressive rock, kosmische musik, synth rock, jazz rock, heavy metal,glam rock, funk, electro and bubblegum pop. Psychedelic music was revived in a variety of forms of neopsychedelia from the 1980s, in psychedelic hip hop and re-emerged in electronic music in genres including acid house, trance music and new rave.
Characteristics
A number of features are often included in psychedelic music. Exotic instrumentation, with a particular fondness for the sitar and tabla are common. Songs often have more complex song structures, key and time signature changes, modal melodies and drones than contemporary pop music. Surreal, whimsical, esoterically or literary-inspired, lyrics are often used. There is often a strong emphasis on extended instrumental solos or jams, typically featuring a heavily distorted electric guitar as the main instrument. Electric guitars are used to create feedback, and are played through wah wah and fuzzbox effect pedals. There is a strong keyboard presence, in the 1960s this especially using electronic organs, harpsichords, or the Mellotron, an early tape-driven 'sampler' keyboard. Elaborate studio effects are often used, such as backwards tapes, panning, phasing, long delay loops, and extreme reverb. In the 1960s there was a use of primitive electronic instruments such as early synthesizers and the theremin. Later forms of electronic psychedelia also employed repetitive computer-generated beats
Psychedelic music bands often used new recording techniques and effects and drew on non-Western sources such as the ragas and drones of Indian music. Psychedelic influences spread into folk, rock, and soul, creating the subgenres of psychedelic folk, psychedelic rock, psychedelic pop and psychedelic soul in the late 1960s before declining in the early 1970s. Psychedelic music bands expanded their musical horizons, and went on to create and influence many new musical genres including progressive rock, kosmische musik, synth rock, jazz rock, heavy metal,glam rock, funk, electro and bubblegum pop. Psychedelic music was revived in a variety of forms of neopsychedelia from the 1980s, in psychedelic hip hop and re-emerged in electronic music in genres including acid house, trance music and new rave.
Characteristics
A number of features are often included in psychedelic music. Exotic instrumentation, with a particular fondness for the sitar and tabla are common. Songs often have more complex song structures, key and time signature changes, modal melodies and drones than contemporary pop music. Surreal, whimsical, esoterically or literary-inspired, lyrics are often used. There is often a strong emphasis on extended instrumental solos or jams, typically featuring a heavily distorted electric guitar as the main instrument. Electric guitars are used to create feedback, and are played through wah wah and fuzzbox effect pedals. There is a strong keyboard presence, in the 1960s this especially using electronic organs, harpsichords, or the Mellotron, an early tape-driven 'sampler' keyboard. Elaborate studio effects are often used, such as backwards tapes, panning, phasing, long delay loops, and extreme reverb. In the 1960s there was a use of primitive electronic instruments such as early synthesizers and the theremin. Later forms of electronic psychedelia also employed repetitive computer-generated beats