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PSYCHEDELIC/SPACE ROCK
A Progressive Rock Sub-genre
From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website
Psychedelic/Space Rock definition
Psychedelic Progressive Rock
Progressive rock music has its roots in the mid 1960's psychedelic cultural phenomena. During that time British Invasion and folk-rock bands began to expand the sonic possibilities of their music. These groups started slowly to abandon the brief, concise verse-chorus-verse patterns of rock & roll, and moved towards more free-form, fluid song structures. Just as important, the groups began incorporating elements of Indian and Eastern music, and along them the free-from principles of free jazz were included to the psychedelic sound, emphasising spontaneous emotions over calculated and estimated construction of music. Also experimenting with electronically altering instruments and voices within the studio using new technology was part of the style. Acid rock groups like THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE and CREAM stand as descriptive and also popular examples of the path from psychedelic sunshine pop towards more aggressive and strong rock expression, culminated especially their improvised live performances.
The boundary of classifying where the amount of experimentalism and artistic content of their music justifies term 'progressive' is probably a thin red line. The early 1960's psychedelic prog pioneers listed to the Prog Archives are mostly found from the Proto-Prog section, (unless the band had a longer career like PINK FLOYD), and among these early psych related are bands like THE BEATLES, THE DOORS, JEFFERSON AIRPLANE and VANILLA FUDGE for example.
A music being classified as psychedelic progressive rock may contain the elements described before with varying combinations, but also the artistic perspective of progressive rock. The evolvement of the psychedelic depth within progressive context could be seen for example in the 1960's recordings of ARCADIUM and BABY GRANDMOTHERS. A good example of the Continental European early 1970's progressive psych rock could be the album by group AHORA MAZDA, and from Britain JADE WARRIOR's early records fusion both psychedelic rock and ethnic music. Two groups producing vintage music today in the tradition of 60's/70's style and sound could be THE SPACIOUS MINDS and ACID MOTHER'S TEMPLE. As the psychedelic movement was a large cultural phenomenon, it is difficult to fence psychedelic progressive rock into a one tight category. Psychedelic progressive rock has been developing to various different directions, which have been classified as their own genres and sub genres.
Progressive Space Rock
In the late 1960s space rock emerged from psychedelic rock with the result of quasi binovular twins. The bands began to assimilate krautrock elements like repetitive hypnotic beats and electronic/ambient soundscapes. The typical instrumentation includes the synthesizer which generally offers bubbling tones and spacey patterns provoking a gliding flow. Guitars are played with glissando technique and delay/echo effects in preference. Reggae/dub elements are to detect here and there. Space rock is often coupled with the use of drugs and a mind-expanding approach, similar to krautrock. Several bands combine their live performances with a trippy lightshow using random fractals. Albums are mostly provided with at least one long meandering jam based on a main theme, loops and slight variations respectively ups and downs in waves.
You will often take notice of stories, pictures and album/song titles referring to cosmic themes. HAWKWIND's live album 'Ritual' is said to be the ultimate space rock album because of the collaboration with sci-fi author Michael Moorcock. His lyrics are performed by a narrator and underlaid with synth elements. PINK FLOYD can be treated as pioneers of spacey music during the band's early phase, for example some songs of 'The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn' or the live recordings of 'Ummagumma' with the stirring 'Careful With That Axe Eugene'. GROBSCHNITT's epic 'Solar Music' is counted among the space rock classics too. UFO, which released the extraordinary album 'Flying - One Hour Space Rock' in 1971, stands for those rock bands which were influenced by this style at least for a while. Another often mentioned band is GONG which offered some groundbreaking genre albums in the early period.
A space rock community is existing in nearly every country more or less. Swedish bands are known for a brisk exchange of musicians among each other. The 'Strange Daze' festivals from 1997-2000 showcased the American space rock scene. Japan is an unexhaustible reservoir of psychedelic and space prog output. Some other representative bands of the style are ORESUND SPACE COLLECTIVE with the focus on long grooving improvisations, QUARKSPACE and OZRIC TENTACLES emphasizing more electronic elements or VESPERO and HIDRIA SPACEFOLK with a significant ethnic component. Other groups like ESCAPADE and THE LEGENDARY PINK DOTS are standing for an avantgarde style whereas the sound of SUBARACHNOID SPACE or KINSKI is provided with transitions to the post rock genre.
Interfaces with other prog genres
As psychedelic culture influenced largely the whole western pop culture scene, psychedelic elements can be found from the other prog genres too. Psychedelic Folk / Acid Folk is a large and delightful sub genre, and in Prog Archives these bands can be found from the PROG FOLK category, earliest of them being PROTO-PROG similar time. As an example group, FAIRPORT CONVENTION with SANDY DENNY released few albums, which combined traditional folk music with psychedelic elements, and their long song 'A Sailor's Life' with real interactive improvisational playing had a big influence on psychedelic folk groups like THE TREES. Some psychedelic oriented folk bands also played music outside from the Anglo-Saxon frame of reference, like Italian AKTUALA, blended Middle-Eastern folk music to their records, and British JADE WARRIOR was seeking influences form Japanese and African music. Groups like THE THIRD EAR BAND and QUINTESSENCE experimented with elements from eastern and Indian music, which kind of bands are found more from the genre INDO-PROG/RAGA ROCK. Instead of European roots these artists take their elements from raga, classical India music. During mid-60's RAVI SHANKAR brought raga to success in the Western Christian industrial countries, and it's qualities were adopted to psychedelic culture, as both raga and psychedelia focus on the state of emotional trance. Example record from this genre could be SEVENTH SONS album 'Raga' from year 1964.
In Germany the groups which were influenced by the British psychedelia, formed their own genre called KRAUTROCK. The early 1970's groups of this genre represent the progressive acid rock sound of Germany, experimenting long instrumental improvisations emphasizing use of psychedelic effects and weird electronic sounds. Examples of these groups could be AMON DÜÜL, ASH RA TEMPEL, CAN, GÄA, NECRONOMICON and YATHA SIDHRA. PROGRESSIVE ELECTRONIC style emerged from Krautrock, and some of their most influential artists like TANGERINE DREAM and KLAUS SCHULZE started with very psychedelic musical style, also being part in the evolvement of 'space rock' sound.
In addition of these genres and examples, psychedelic elements can be found from many other genres of progressive rock. The psychedelic cultural explosion had an immense influence to the western popular culture, and hints of it can still be heard also outside the field of progressive rock music scope, for example in the stoner rock music, or in the collective techno rave parties carrying the legacy of the audiovisual attack 1968 PINK FLOYD concerts.
Space rock definition by Rivertree, April 2009
Other text by Eetu Pellonpää October 2006/April 2009
Psychedelic/Space Rock Top Albums
Showing only studios | Based on members ratings & PA algorithm | Show Top 100 Psychedelic/Space Rock
| More Top Prog lists and filters
 4.62 | 808 ratings WISH YOU WERE HERE Pink Floyd |
4.55 | 856 ratings DARK SIDE OF THE MOON Pink Floyd |
4.50 | 591 ratings ANIMALS Pink Floyd |
4.27 | 452 ratings MEDDLE Pink Floyd |
 4.19 | 154 ratings OCEAN Eloy |
4.29 | 91 ratings WARRIOR ON THE EDGE OF TIME Hawkwind |
4.02 | 503 ratings THE WALL Pink Floyd |
4.12 | 84 ratings DAWN Eloy |
3.94 | 340 ratings THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN Pink Floyd |
4.19 | 57 ratings PLANETS Eloy |
4.06 | 97 ratings A TAB IN THE OCEAN Nektar |
4.05 | 92 ratings FRAMES Oceansize |
4.12 | 61 ratings JURASSIC SHIFT Ozric Tentacles |
3.88 | 368 ratings ATOM HEART MOTHER Pink Floyd |
4.02 | 87 ratings SILENT CRIES AND MIGHTY ECHOES Eloy |
4.06 | 65 ratings EFFLORESCE Oceansize |
4.07 | 58 ratings DEAD AIR FOR RADIOS Chroma Key |
3.95 | 105 ratings REMEMBER THE FUTURE Nektar |
4.43 | 23 ratings JOURNEY Brown's Kingdom Come, Arthur |
3.98 | 74 ratings HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN GRILL Hawkwind |
Psychedelic/Space Rock overlooked and obscure gems albums
Random 4 (reload page for new list) | As selected by the Psychedelic/Space Rock experts
GAMMAPOLISZ (Ù 9)Omega |
THE XENON CODEXHawkwind |
LORD SPACE DEVILCosmic Trip Machine |
BABY GRANDMOTHERSBaby Grandmothers |
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Latest Psychedelic/Space Rock Music Reviews
Ragnarok Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
sinkadotentree
Prog Reviewer
I have their two studio albums and the live one.This is my least favourite,mostly because of the
female singer who's vocals i'm just not a fan of.
This is mellotron heaven though and that's what makes it so good along with the tracks i'm
familiar with from their live release.Interesting that those songs feature male vocals. "Butterfly
Sky" is a dreamy,melancholic tune with lots of mellotron and those laid back male
vocals.Great tune. "Rainbow Bridge" is another highlight.It's very mellow to start.Male vocals
after 4 minutes.This sounds so beautiful.The vocals become more passionate 5 1/2 minutes
in. "Raga" is the other highlight for me.
I love the style of music this band from New Zealand plays and if you can get your hands on
their "Nooks" album or the live one you will be impressed i'm sure.This one is good but the
female vocals bring down the rating for me.3.5 stars.
Pink Floyd Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by mscbox
Ummagumma is one of the albums that is special. Special, because it is a unique album, in a
style not done by others, certainly not before. It is also an album that creates a specific
atmosphere, a specialty that belongs to Pink Floyd anyway. But is the music exceptionally
good? Are there songs on this album that ask for special attention? I am afraid that my answer
is no. It is nice to listen to, but it is not the music that you often listen to. I have to say that
especially the "solostic" parts on the original second lp weaken the album to a rating of only a
3. That is a pity because the first LP is maybe not excellent but at least essential due to the
uniqueness.
Hawkwind Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Bonnek
Prog Reviewer
After a disappointing decade, Hawkwind regained some of their stamina in the 90's and became a
trusted source again for good studio albums and excellent live ones. Generally, all of the 90's
albums vary ambient synth pieces with classic Hawkwind hard-rocking trips. The rocking side is represented by the magnificent opener LSD. Alan Davey lays down a great bass groove that makes us finally stop to regret that Lemmy left in 1975. After the two opening minutes with typical Hawkwind chants, his heavy rolling bass takes the lead in the 6 minute improvisation that follows. More psychedelic punkrock and thumping bass can be enjoyed on The Secret Agent and Right To Decide. But there are also a number of rock songs that feel less inspired, Mask of the Morning and Sadness Runs Deep are average Hawkwind songs that need lots of sparkling effects and Arabian-tinged syrup to make them somewhat enjoyable.
Those 5 rockers make up 35 minutes of the album. The other half is filled with very strong instrumentals that go from Schulzean dreamscapes such as the lovely Blue Shift and Space Dust to mid-paced 'Gong meets Pink Floyd' excursions such as Death of War and Don't Understand. The world-beat of Going To Hawaii almost sounds like an outtake from Peter Gabriel's Passion that was buried under a thick Hawkwind synth gravy. Nice one.
Electric Tepee is a slightly uneven but fine album to extend your Hawkwind experience. Live albums not included, I would place this one a league behind my favourite trio of Warrior, Quark & Levitation. But it's still worth an upped 3.5 stars.
Ozric Tentacles Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by Kyle McTreehugger
I actually found out about this band just from randomly clicking on a psychadelic band that had
a cool name because I'm very into psychadelic. So I decided to dowload their newest album
so I could get a feel for the direction the band had been headed. The Yum Yum Tree is the first
album that I have listened to of this band. Although, I normally prefer a less synthesized sound,
this album won me over within the first couple minutes. Every moment of listening to this
album was pure amazement and happiness that I had found such an amazing album. The
level of musicianship I feel is substantial enough to satisfy prog fans. The song Oddweird is a
very happy one that I especially injoyed on the album. Styles of funk, reggae, and others are
present sparsely which give the album a nice sound variety.
Dream Machine Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
snobb
Special Collaborator Jazz Rock/Fusion
What a pleasant surprise! From the very first sounds I was really attracted by this
album's music! Short opener is acoustic neo-classic intro, very soon continued by great
spacey jazz-rock "Vasta Wazza " composition with some oriental influences and strong Gong
roots. Excellent fusion drumming and flute built perfect soundscapes."Dub Dub" is reggae
rhythm based compositions, but very airy, full of flute, guitar and percussion."Happy Dragon" all are Ian Anderson-like flute, but with bluesy guitar, jazzy bass and drums all around. Fresh and interesting."Vanishing Point" is more psychedelic song, but again - very light and airy."Sugar Glider ?shows you great bass, spacey sound effects and wah- wah electric guitar in fast pulsation.
"Mantra" has its Anduvian flute scent in combination with oriental melody. Eastern winds gave even bigger effect there in songs sound.
Very interesting and quite unusual work. If not too much inventive, music there is so fresh, pleasant and almost hypnotizing, that will return back to listen this album again very soon!
Hawkwind Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Bonnek
Prog Reviewer
Xenon Codex is appreciated by many fans as a return to form. For me it's a "no, not really".
It's a flat and dreary album. Being quite the Hawkfan, this would banish it to that one desolate
star. But I think I'll reserve that one for the 1982/1983 albums if I ever get to review them. The problem is not in the intention. I'm sure the band had the ambition to do a good space-rock album that stayed true to all spaceship commands. But they decided to make it sound up to date, and that wasn't a particularly good idea in 1988. Before the Pixies and Nirvana restored the rock sound and before thrash metal surfaced in the mainstream, a deteriorated plastic pastiche of the early 80's new wave sound was the flavour of the day. For a rock band like Hawkwind that is a let-down. The synthetic drums are so devoid of life, it's painful.
But also the songs aren't much to write home about, too much rock clichés with repetitive vocals that make each track sound like 20 other Hawkwind tunes. There are songs with some potential though. The War I Survived can surely be made into a lot of fun in a live setting. Wastelands of Sleep has a nice spacey guitar that washes over an electronic pulse. Also Heads resides in similar droning trances, but a much better version appears on Palace Springs.
That's all there is to it for me; the remainder pretty much passes me by completely unnoticed.
Hawkwind Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Bonnek
Prog Reviewer
You can't go wrong with a Hawkwind Live one. It usually comes with the guarantee of a solid setlist
and an inspired performance. This California Brainstorm is from the short period when Bridget
Wishhart fronted Hawkwind, meaning that the official live album Palace Spring released in
1991 is an obvious point of reference. Compared to Palace Springs, this one is for completists. First of all there's the recording quality. All instruments are clearly audible but the frequency range is very limited. There's no power in the lower end and the high end is dull. Actually it sounds as if you would rip Palace Springs to a 96kbps mp3. Meaning thin and flat.
The setlist is quite interesting, featuring some old classic and rare live gems such as Ejection, Brainstorm and Reefer Madness (sung by Bridget). But none of these versions are a compulsory listen. The band plays tightly but the rearrangements are generally disappointing. Ejection lacks its original upbeat drive, Brainstorm is reduced to 3 minutes and extended with a reggae improvisation that also ended up on Palace Springs. Reefer Madness is better then its studio version but that wasn't hard to achieve given the lifeless original.
Void's End is better avoided. It's just an improvisation on the instrumental middle part. Nothing like the superb version on Palace Springs. The more recent material is adequate but doesn't deviate too much from the studio originals. Definitely a fan's item.
Pink Floyd Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Marty McFly
Collaborator Errors and Omissions Team
We have to differ good from bad guys and girls, men and women, ladies and gentlemen, prog night addicts and daytime
embracers, am I right ? When something quite good gets very good rating, we have to either adjust rating for even better album,
or fix first one to more fit to each other.This is under-estimated masterpiece. Orchestral parts forced to work together as slave labor to Pink Floyd's band members (except Nick, he gets sunshine most of the time). Of course, in this case, when counting out Mason, it's Gilmour who's most prominent, but that's standard situation here, so no raised eyebrows this time. First epic, or if you want, suite. I first heard it about six years ago, when my father was (intentionally) presenting me Pink Floyd's music. I remember two things: I didn't like it much and second one: it was ancient Roman like (these trumpets), it reminded me something like Quo Vadis, or simply these old Rome films. I've returned to this album again when I saw one certain thread about epics. Someone (thanks) said that AHM is in fact first epic. So I took this as a little push-forward and tried it.
5(-), I don't regret. It's one of these albums where you can enjoy every part of it and you're still smiling wide. So high rating because it's Pink Floyd = guarantee of quality. And so it works, it's a very good one. I've said it, I've said it.
Hawkwind Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Bonnek
Prog Reviewer
Hawkwind had a short and exciting fling with artsy punk in the 1977-1979 years. But in 1980 they
returned to their usual hard rocking space flare with their solid Levitation. So I really had
my hopes up for this one.And indeed, after 5 minutes of sonic poetry the album finally kicks off with Rocky Paths, a fun blast of space hardrock with a steady upbeat pace, good vocals and piercing guitar soloing. All of it drowned in an abundant cosmic synth soup. A classic!
But there's a notable difference with Levitation. Ginger Baker, who kicked the hell out of his kit on Levitation has left the spaceship and his replacement Martin Griffin restricts himself to basic rock rhythms. The drumkit also suffers from the typical 80's gated drums production (the big reverbed snare-syndrome). It kills off the attack and dynamism, for a drum aficionado like me, that's always a big loss.
A second problem with this album is the lack of ideas. Unless you get a kick out of sci-fi poetry, Sonic Attack, Psychosonia, Virgin of the World and Coded Language won't register any higher then filler status. And Tim Blake is surely missed on the unimaginative synth sequencing of Virgin of The World.
Next to Rocky Paths there's one other memorable song here: Angels of Death, which is also featured on each of the 34 subsequent live albums Hawkwind released since. The remainder of the songs are painful to listen to, seemingly thrown together from half-baked rock clichés with invariably recitative vocals and predictable arrangements. There's an occasional groove as on Trans-dimensional Man but they don't manage to do much with it.
Sonic Coma would have been a more suitable title.
Eloy Psychedelic/Space Rock
Review by
Tarcisio Moura
Prog Reviewer
Eloy´s comeback after more than a decade has brought me a lot of mixed feelings when I first heard
it and ti still does after several spinnings. Visionary sounds like a sum of everything Eloy has
done in their career (but more specificly around the Planets/Time To Turn period). Which means that
nothing new came with this CD. It is mostly a reharsh of their former self. So I guess I should be
glad with that since I was never really charmed by their more eletronic work in albums like Ra and
Destination. The bad side of Visionary is that of the new songs: too much vocals (not one of their best aspects in any record) and not really convincing themes and arrangements. The playing is as fine as ever (great bass lines by Klaus-Peter Matziol, good guitar parts, very good vintage sounding keyboards). The main problem seems to be a lacking of boldiness like they did on Ocean 2 and The Tides Return Forever, where they again plowed on familiar ground but still delivered strong and relevant material. On Visionary the tunes are ok, but you have the strong impression you heard it all before and done in a better way: The Challenge for instance, is almost Time To Turn with another set of lyrics.
Conclusion: Visionary is a pleasant album, if you´re not a too demanding fan. Rating: somewhere 2,5 and 3 stars. Good, but not essential in any way.
Psychedelic/Space Rock bands/artists list
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Eetu Pellonpää
Psychedelic Prog Specialist Team
Joined date: 6/17/2005 | Posts: 3928 | Last visit: 2/9/2010 2:27:36 AM EST
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Bilek (Bilek Güler)
Psychedelic Prog Specialist Team
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Rivertree (Uwe Zickel)
Psych/Space Team & Band Submissions
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Windhawk (Olav Martin Bjørnsen)
Neo Prog/Xover Teams & Band Submissions
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DamoXt7942 (Keishiro Maki)
Psych/Space Team (Jap. Psych Specialist)
Joined date: 10/15/2008 | Posts: 1221 | Last visit: 2/9/2010 6:21:31 AM EST
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