An overview of the genre

In contrast to several of the other genres covered in this book, psychedelia was, in the main, contained within a relatively short historical period. In broad terms, psychedelia and the psychedelic era (the two are almost indivisible) stretched between 1966 and 1969. This is not to say that psychedelic elements, whether technological, structural, timbral or social, do not endure to the present day, but rather that the overall ‘package’, intrinsically linked to the specifics of the late-1960s’ period, was unique, and in overall terms unrepeatable.

This era, and particularly the so-called ‘summer of love’ in 1967, has been mythologised more than any other era in pop's historiography. For Simon Frith, it was ‘the year it all came together’ (Frith 1982: 4-20), a relatively modest claim compared to other, more hyperbolic statements that grant canonic, even transcendental, status to certain psychedelic acts or albums. What is indisputable is that a large number of important musical and extra-musical conjunctural factors did exercise a great impact upon large social groupings within Western society, and upon the musical artefacts produced around that time.

Psychedelic music was built upon elements contained in a wide range of pop and non-pop genres: beat, R&B, 1960s’ garage, jazz, folk, classical, certain north African and Eastern musical idioms and avant-garde experimentalism. Its willing embrace of new technologies and production processes acted to radically change the sound palette, the subject matter and the artistic ambition of mainstream pop. Psychedelic music was influential in establishing the notion that recordings and performances were separate entities, which fed directly into the construction of the binary opposition of rock/pop in the late 1960s.

Unusually for pop innovation, many early examples of psychedelic experimentation emerged from the commercial mainstream. In early 1966, bands such as The Beatles and The Byrds, with the power of major labels and state-of-the-art studios at their disposal, produced tracks that were recognised, even at the time, as ground-breaking. The Byrds’ Eight Miles High (actually recorded in December 1965) and The Beatles’ Revolver album (specifically tracks such as Tomorrow Never Knows, recorded April/May 1966) signalled a seismic shift in terms of artistic ambition, creative influences and studio craftsmanship.