Psychedelic

Exposure - Connan Mockasin

Erol Alkan's psychedelic protegé talks motivation and ideal album lengths

21 Sep 2011

Originally from Hawkes Bay in New Zealand, Connan Mockasin has lived in London for the last five years, during which time he’s covered Michael Jackson, worked with Charlotte Gainsbourg, played with Crowded House (find him below alongside them and Johnny…

Moonface - Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped

Canadian multi-tasker Spencer Krug delivers more psychedelic haziness

3 Aug 2011

(Jagjaguwar) Better to be busy than bored right? It certainly seems that’s the mantra of Spencer Krug, core member of Canadian collectives Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown, Swan Lake and Frog Eyes. This time around, with Wolf Parade on hiatus, Krug has…

Glasgow psych-rock night Eyes Wide Open set for successful 2011

Sixth year strong for freakbeat night at Blackfriars

11 Jan 2011

‘This night will be our New Year celebration take two,’ says Holly Calder, promoter of Glasgow psych-rock-freakbeat night Eyes Wide Open. ‘Our friends are going to be scattered around all over at Hogmanay, so this will be a nice way to bring everyone…

Bear in Heaven bring psychedelic rock to Edge Festival

Brooklyn's finest take Beast Rest Forth Mouth on the road

14 Aug 2010

Putting a psychedelic spin on their brand of stoner rock, Brooklyn’s Bear in Heaven, who were responsible for this spring’s Beast Rest Forth Mouth serenade the Fringe with their proggy, poppy sound. HMV Picture House, 08444 999 990, Thu 26 Aug…

The Besnard Lakes set for Edge Festival date

Montreal psychedelic rockers play Sneaky Pete's, Edinburgh

8 Aug 2010

This Montreal quartet’s third album, The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night, has been shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize, which is Canada’s equivalent to the Mercury, and are up against the likes of Broken Social Scene, Caribou and Owen Pallett.

Exposure: Kassidy

1 Jul 2010

What happens when you mix multi-layered acoustic guitars, blues, boogie rock and add a hint of country? You get four piece Glaswegian band Kassidy. Named after Butch Cassidy, but dropping the C for a K to avoid confusion with the American rapper of the…

Bear in Heaven

Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Sat 24 April 2010

12 May 2010

Brooklyn four-piece Bear in Heaven have reinvented psychedelic rock. As equally indebted to 70s American stoner rock and as they are to the rhythmic stabbing synths of early New Order or exploratory jams of Can, their synths and drums-led shoegaze is…

Exposure: Bear in Heaven

23 Mar 2010

Our Bear, who art in Heaven: hallowed be thy epic space-pop, thy divine psychedelia, thy dense electro, thy mammoth kraut-rock. Fortified with a reverent live persuasion and an excellent second album, Beast Rest Forth Mouth (Hometapes), it is little…

Labels of Love - Firecracker Recordings profile

23 Jul 2009

Based in Leith, Edinburgh Roster Linkwood (Nick Moore, from Bristol but based in Leith), Fudge Fingas (Gavin Sutherland, from Edinburgh), Vakula (from Ukraine), Intrusion (one half of the Detroit/Chicago-based duo Echospace), House of Traps (Lindsay…

Thomas Pynchon: Inherent Vice

9 Jul 2009

Less than half the length of his last 1000-page tome and riffing on the relatively straightforward hardboiled crime genre as opposed to the exhausting literary mash-up of Against the Day, Thomas Pynchon’s seventh novel is the reclusive author’s most…

White Denim: Fits

9 Jul 2009

The Texan trio who hit the ground running a year ago with their impressively disparate debut Workout Holiday are back with an even wilder polyphonic follow-up. Appropriately titled Fits, this schizoid record veers from avant punk to psychedelic funk…

The Horrors

28 May 2009

At first glance The Horrors appeared to be an art punk joke, but their debut album Strange House thrashed with an addictive spook-show garage rock fury, Faris Rotter proving to be one of the most entertaining and unpredictable frontmen in Britain. New…

Pumajaw - Curiosity Box

18 Sep 2008

PSYCHEDELIC FOLK Is this thing on? That’s what you might be asking yourself as the first album for Fire by Fence Collective affiliates Pinkie Maclure and John Wills kicks in. Against the picking of a lone guitar, shimmering bells and whispered vocals…

MGMT

8 May 2008

PSYCHEDELIC ROCK The Liquid Room, Edinburgh, Fri 9 May A lot of bands take themselves too seriously, but not MGMT. For evidence, get yourself to YouTube and check out the video for fantastic recent single ‘Time to Pretend’, a song satirising the…