Musical Psychedelia

This thought-provoking collection offers a broad introduction to the field of psychedelic music studies, bringing together scholarly work on psychedelic music in genres like rock, folk, electronic dance music and pop.

Psychedelic music is a fascinating yet under-researched field of study. This thought-provoking collection offers a broad introduction to the field of psychedelic music studies, bringing together scholarly work on psychedelic music in genres like rock, folk, electronic dance music and pop. Through an expanded purview on psychedelic music, an emerging trend in research, the collection affords students and academics alike an introduction to a rich, multi-faceted field.

The contributing authors explore a range of different facets of musical psychedelia: its transgressive and transcendent aspects, its foregrounding of timbre and texture, the way it changes our perception of time, its influence on "non-psychedelic" music, key composition and production techniques that composers and musicians use in its creation, how it is mediated by different places and spaces, and the interplay between psychedelic visual and sonic aesthetics.

This interdisciplinary work reveals both commonalities in musical psychedelic experiences and the contestation inherent in a field of study that juxtaposes music of different genres and eras with a variety of theoretical approaches and methodologies. In broadening the scope of psychedelic music research, the collection not only makes for varied and absorbing reading on the subject level but also stimulates reflexive thought about interdisciplinary research.

Autorentext

Gemma L. Farrell, PhD, is an Associate Researcher in the Music Department at the University of Sussex, UK, and author of Psychedelic Style and Embodiment in Psytrance (PhD thesis, 2019).

Inhalt

Introduction

GEMMA L. FARRELL

PART I

1. A Splendid Time is Guaranteed for All: The Recreation of the Beatles Sgt. Pepper Album on Stage

ANTHONY MEYNELL AND ALAIN PIRE

2. A New Kind of Blue: Connections between Early West Coast Psychedelic Music and Jazz (1963-68)

TOM ZLABINGER

3. From Soul to Psychedelic Soul and Beyond: Sonic Experience and Sound configuration

GUILLAUME DUPETIT

4. DJ's skills and psychedelic trance's rules: Temporalities of the psychedelic experience in European electronic dance music

AURÉLIEN DJEBBARI AND ELINA DJEBBARI

5. Psychedelic spheres: sonic spaces and party places in psytrance

GEMMA L. FARRELL

PART II

6. Rings around the world: The psychedelic ripple effect in a global set and setting

NEIL BURNS

7. Psychedelia, Occulture and the Dark Rock-n-Rave Crossover

DANIEL SIEPMANN

8. Transcendental Psychedelia: hearing hearing in the work of Maryanne Amacher

WILL SCHRIMSHAW

9. Ecstatic-Materialist Sound: A Cross-Genre Aesthetic in Today's Experimental Music RICCARDO D. WANKE

PART III

10. Journeys Around the Secret Place

KRISZTIÁN HOFSTÄDTER

11. Because the Night Belongs to Sex, 'Drugs' and Rock 'n' Roll: The Nocturnal Integration of Promiscuity, Psychoactive Substance-Seeking and Musicality in Human Evolution

Marco Antonio Correa Varella and Jaroslava Varella Valentova

12. Spirituality, Substance Use and Transformation in Electronic Dance Music Culture: Results from a Quantitative Study

THOMAS J. JOHNSON, DANIELLE D. WEISMAN, VIRGIL L. SHEETS, BRIANNA TODD & CODY LESNIAK.

Index