The Missing Links - You're Driving Me Insane

Now we're talking...back to the British beat, the FREAKBEAT! Although this is actually from Sydney in '65. I'm sure Freakbeat Phil included several Australian and Dutch 45s in his freakbeat micro-genre roundup...I guess so long as it's not American and has been touched by the hand of mayhem it's in. This is buzzing with so much electricity on so many fronts. Lust, violence, noise... I've finally caught the spice-y virus and well my brain just can't think up the words to express the vibe for this song... If you don't already know the tune just press play and voilà it'll be one of your 60s favourites.

Beacon Street Union - The Clown Died In Marvin Gardens

Mr Simon Reynolds joins in the psych fest. He suggests this, another good bit of daggy Boston psychedelia from 1968. These guys were part of the phoney Bosstown Sound scene along with Ultimate Spinach and Orpheus. It starts out as a tepid Love rip off but then a flute enters and by the end a nifty little guitar break emerges creating a noice mini psych freak out.  

Ultimate Spinach - (Ballad Of The) Hip Death Goddess

I guess the best way to describe this is daggy psychedelia. Ultimate Spinach were acolytes of folk rock and San Francisco style psych but they were far from the happening scenes of the day (Texas, San Fran, LA etc.) as they were Bostonians. They are the sort of band that never quite make the grade with regard to lists of psych but often rate a mention as second tier runners up that might be worth a listen once you're done with the good stuff. Anyway that's all beside the point as Hip Death Goddess is a stellar tripped out acid rock epic. This jam could have continued for another 10 minutes and I wouldn't have minded at all.

Blue Orchids - Sun Connection

I always get a delightful surprise listening to Blue Orchids for some reason...it's probably something to do with the fact they are really forgotten and hardly even a cult band. Other neo-psych groups of the era with whom they have a spiritual affinity like Meat Puppets or even a band Blue Orchids influenced like The Chills have their place in the history of 80s rock with fanbases to match. The debut Blue Orchids LP The Greatest Hit (Money Mountain) from 1982 despite being a big independent hit has never been reissued on vinyl and only ever got released on cd once, back in 2003. It's hard to believe a group made up of ex members of The Fall who made an idiosyncratic masterstroke of acid fried anti-establishment Pagan post-punk neo-psych are not celebrated by the underground. Perhaps they are just too unique and will only appeal to those with a penchant for the esoteric.  

Sun Connection is the opening song off The Greatest Hit. Once again Martin Bramah is in druid mystic mode. A very LSD vibe where his drug addled mind is trying to square away paradoxical notions such as the purity of a spiritual utopia and the encroaching reality of the necessity of money to survive. These existential dilemmas are delivered via that vocal trick of all of a sudden metamorphosing tunelessness into melodic elation and back again. All the while a mesmeric web of guitars and keys organically shift from tense passages to pastoral flourishes which has an added alchemical frisson as Bramah and organist Una Baines were romantically involved. 

Blue Orchids - A Year With No Head

Forgotten post-punk neo-psychedelic greatness from 1982. Hypnotic organ, a glistening fried guitar, a dark bass line and a rhythmic guitar all swirl in unison as mystic recalcitrant Martin Bramah philosophises blissfully over the the top, mesmerising.  

Fire Engines - Meat Whiplash

Were Fire Engines the best band of 1981? Anyway this is where fellow Scots Meat Whiplash got their name from: The b-side to Fire Engines 1981 single Candyskin which was released on the Pop Aural label. While it's a nervy post-punk gem it fits in with these recently posted tunes because there's a weird phazed psych guitar bit amongst the noisey frenetic post-punk shenanigans. 

Meat Puppets - Two Rivers

While the entire 1985 LP Up On The Sun is a sun baked roadside cactus of serene funky psychedelic perfection, Two Rivers is where they go into the mystic with sublime results. Words are no justice for this splendour. 

Mercury Rev - Chasing a Bee

The greatest neo-psych jam ever. Perhaps the greatest OTT psych tune of all time too. I guess you can't really compare 60s psych to 90s neo-psych though because by the time of Mercury Rev there were so many more influences going into the music from prog, krautrock, space rock, punk, post-punk, goth, post-hardcore, noise-pop, shoegaze and whatever else I've forgotten. I was expecting this tune to have lost its lustre now it's over 30 years old but no it is still fucking astounding. Dave Baker era Rev is still the best. If you only know Mercury Rev due to 1998's Deserter's Songs chart success well let me tell ya...you're missing out. In 1991 the cult band released the outstanding sprawling kaleidoscopic masterpiece Yerself Is Steam and then followed it up in 1993 with the equally mind-bending hallucinogenic Boces. For these two LPs the mercurial presence of singer Dave Baker gave the band an unhinged quality that would disappear from the group after he left in 94.  

The Moffs - Another Day In The Sun

If you know you know. 80s neo-psych classic from Sydney-siders The Moffs. I've heard this a million times and it still casts the same spell on me as it did the first time I heard it on Rage in the 80s. A tone like no other in a song like no other. As a teenager I assumed there would be or had already been more tunes like this but really this is a singular vision that was never repeated. 

True West - Steps To The Door

A primo slice of neo-psych from the Paisley Underground in 1983. Now if I recall correctly the singer and the guitarist from True West had both been in a band with Kendra Smith and Steve Wynn prior to the formation of Dream Syndicate. These guys coulda been contenders as they had some ace tuneage but it was the 80s and groups like this seemed to just fizzle out into inconsequence.