Spiritual psychedelia (even if it is a punchline). The music in this episode all tends toward the spiritual. This episode leads off with “Zenith” by Avdey, a track that explores how a person can become one with the universe, followed by “By the Hand of God” by Children’s Ice Cream. The playlist concludes with “Brotherhood […]
Reissues, Compilations & Archival Recordings Released in 2020 Labels and bands look through their back catalogs, often finding gems to reissue or to release for the first time. This episode of Turn Me On, Dead Man looks over such offerings that were released in 2020. 00:00 Turn Me On Dead Man – Intro01:06 13th Floor […]
It’s Super Bowl Sunday and what better way to mark the occasion than with some new psychedelia? Actually only two of the bands in this episode’s playlist are from the US. Four of the bands are from the UK where, I understand, the NFL is trying to establish a foothold. So anyway, the season comes […]
Last year saw a steady stream of new 1960s garage/psych compilations. New comps fell into two categories: obscure international psychedelia or more familiar music reworked around some theme. The first set of this podcast focuses on international psychedelia, most of which are from small labels. The second set covers US and European music, with several […]
Some weird and unusual noises from recent weeks. This music comes from a variety of places, staring off with Miminokoto from Japan and ending with Huillin from Chile. Along the way we’ll hear two bands from Sweden–Sofielund from Malmö and Entheogens from Stockholm–and Year of Taurus from Pescara, Italy, as well as Taras Bulba from Fleetwood, UK. We’ll also hear from Mt. Mountain from Perth, Australia, and four American bands: Devil’s Club (Portland, OR), Psychiatric Metaphors (New Jersey), Epic Ganesh (Tallahassee) and Over Outers (San Francisco). It’s a battle for the mind.
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:12 Miminokoto – Mayoiga
05:45 Mt. Mountain – Aplomb
10:12 Taras Bulba – The Moon On The Tides
14:36 Year of Taurus – Fever, When I Was a Child
18:29 Devil’s Club – Wolf
22:11 Sofielund – One thing leading to the next
25:56 Psychiatric Methaphors – Body Snatchers
30:05 Enthoegens – Fire At Will
35:46 Epic Ganesh – Hare Krishna
41:32 Over Outers – Nancy Sings 2
47:58 Huillin – La verdad de la vida está en la impulsividad de la materia
This year is already starting out as strangely as the year we left behind but already some cool music has come out. This episode features garage rock and psychedelia released either late last year or in the new year. I’m warning you with peace and love… Anyway, peace and love, peace and love.
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:37 Tomorrow Never Knows – Six Sixty Six
06:00 The Myriad Dharma – Feel The One
09:05 The Chans – Mind Sweeper
12:24 Dusty Mush – The Features of Your Mind
15:45 The Psychotic Sidewinders – Cold
19:16 Black Temple – Surrender
22:27 Cave Suns – Surt Skum
26:45 The Family Industrial Complex – (I went down to) Strawberry Fields
30:27 Dark Fog – The Contract
38:13 Narrowleaf – Howlin’ In The New Dawn
44:43 Stonegrass – Tea
How do you conclude a year like 2020? I’ve already posted my “Best of 2020” compilation, but I wanted to close out the year by focusing on a few record labels that had a substantial impact in 2020. In particular I wanted to focus on I Heart Noise. This episode also features tracks by Raving Pop Blast, Flower Room, Cardinal Fuzz, and Psychedelic Source Records, who managed to put out one last compilation of 2020. Happy new year, everybody. Let’s hope 2021 is better than 2020.
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:19 Solilians – There Is No Michigan
06:06 Aydin – Cellini
09:43 Skyjelly – Seein It
15:31 William Carlos Whitten – In My Borsalino, Pointing a Revolver
18:00 Turkish Delight – Go Baby
20:17 Sawdust Caesars!! – Flower Pop Show
21:06 Matt LaJoie – Shine a Light on the Light
28:35 Lemurian Folk Songs – Disease Mind I
39:55 Alien Mustangs – Fairy Meadows
49:12 The Janitors – Through The Storm And Into Chaos
56:30 Mugstar – Deep Is The Air
58:18 Petridisch – C/D/E
One of the bright spots of this year of quarantine was that a lot of great music was released. I started the Turn Me On, Dead Man podcast just about this time last year, though I certainly had no idea what was in store for the coming year. Putting together the podcasts turned out to be a great way to use the time I had at home. At first I only contacted a couple of bands but by the time everything was shutting down I was emailing the artists as a matter of course. I was surprised how many bands offered thoughtful responses to my questions.
About my choices for the best of 2020, I actually made four lists. The first a Mixcloud compilation of some of the best tracks of 2020, followed by a list (in no particular order) of some of the best albums of 2020. After that is a list of reissues, compilations and live albums, and finally some singles and EPs–again, in no particular order.
Before I get to that, I’d just like to get one complaint off my chest. My biggest musical disappointment of the year was the delay of the Beatles Let It Be box set. In each of the last three years, Santa has brought me a wonderful Beatles box set (2017: Sgt. Pepper, 2018: The White Album, and 2019: Abbey Road). I was all set for Let It Be this year, complete with the new documentary by Peter Jackson. But like a lot of things in this past year, that didn’t happen. Instead, Apple Music issued this inexplicable little EP on Christmas day. At Home with the Beatles? WTF?
OK, with that out of the way, on with the lists. First up is my best-of-2020 compilation on Mixcloud. Most of these tracks were included on a podcast earlier in the year, but not all.
00:00 Herbcraft – Eon Rd
06:10 Firefriend – Ongoing Crash
10:18 Strange Motel – Dissonance
13:32 Tambourinen – Wollensak
16:39 The Cosmic Rabbit Holes – The Echo Trees
20:00 The Electric Myrrs – Castles in the Sand (The Adventures of Canvas Outtake)
23:23 Dark Fog – In the Background of Your Mind
25:18 Tia Carrera – Layback
32:29 Helicon – In The End
35:56 Alien Mustangs – Waiting The Dawn
40:54 Long Slow Dissolve – Into Darkness
52:44 Yuri Gagarin – The Outskirts of Reality
60:56 Spiral Wave Nomads – Ten Color Ritual
68:15 Satorinaut – Exclusive All Inclusive
82:45 Liquidacid – Karma Driving
95:05 Pilot Voyager – Tremulous
What a strange year this has been. I’m sure we could all list several things that have been terrible, but the psychedelia released during this year continues to dazzle. Most of the tracks in this episode have been released in the final quarter of 2020, with a couple of re-releases thrown in, as well. The playlist concludes with “End of Forever” by Samsara Blues Experiment, a fitting sendoff.
[mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/turnmeondeadman/202019-bogey-dope/ width=100% height=120 hide_cover=1]
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:35 The Cosmic Rabbit Holes – The Echo Trees
05:10 Firefriend – Three-Dimensional Sound Glitch
09:25 Tambourinen – Wollensak
12:44 Self-Immolation Music – Heaven Is Real
16:52 a/lpaca – 24h a day
18:13 Hypnodrone Ensemble – Biglove
24:27 Joseph of Kirenzi – Acid Wave
30:30 The Gjlioteens – The Summer Was Gone
33:56 Upupayāma – Green Cabana
39:45 Grr Boo – This Summer’s About To Bring Me To My End (Single Version)
42:40 Experimental Psychedelic Club – Golden Teacher
52:01 Samsara Blues Experiment – End Of Forever
One of the best discoveries of the year for me has been Psychedelic Source Records. Over the course of the year, I’ve featured tracks by Satorinaut, Lemurian Folk Songs, Pilot Voyager and Liquidacid, all affiliated with Psychedelic Source Records, a music collective of bands that share members and jam together. Located primarily in Páty, Hungary, Psychedelic Source Records has been prolific of late, with each of the artists releasing multiple albums in recent months. Psychedelic Source Records have made all of these recordings available at name your price on Bandcamp. Below you will find a linked word cloud with several of the artists and albums from Psychedelic Source Records, as well as an interview I did by email recently with Bence Ambrus.
[mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/turnmeondeadman/202018-the-truth-unity-and-love-show-psychedelic-source-records/ width=100% height=120 hide_cover=1]
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:32 psychedelic source records – Only the Song II
10:23 Satorinaut – Medieval Gran Tourismo
22:00 Bence Ambrus – We Are All Around
27:38 Liquidacid – Dimeshift
37:25 Pilot Voyager – Melted Lights
43:17 Rawna – Third Eye of the Sun
51:00 Lemurian Folk Songs – La Caleta
These days it does seem like we’re teetering on the brink of some sort of catastrophe, but every day the world lurches on. Maybe, though, we’ve already gone over the edge and we’re just watching this shitshow play out. In any case the great music just keeps coming out. This episode of the Turn Me On, Dead Man podcast features great tracks from across the industrialized world. From the US are Herbcraft (Portland, Maine), Dark Fog (Chicago) Carlton Melton (San Francisco) and a farewell track from the Suzies (Grand Rapids, Michigan). Elsewhere in the Americas are The Suuns (Montreal) and Yajaira (Santiago, Chile), and from Australia comes Los Skallywags (New South Wales). From Europe are Causa Sui (Denmark), Flying Moon in Space (Leipzig, Germany), and coming from further east are Skuma (Chelyabinsk, Russia) and Pree Tone (Kyiv, Ukraine). Closing out the set is a collaboration primarily between Mike Vest (Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK) and Suzuki Junzo (Tokyo) called Mienakunaru.
[mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/turnmeondeadman/202017-already-dead/ width=100% height=120 hide_cover=1]
00:00 TMODM – Intro
01:28 Dark Fog – In The Background Of Your Mind
03:23 Skuma (Скума) – Иза
09:46 Carlton Melton – Waylay
17:46 The Suzies – Bubble Driver
20:32 The Suuns – Death
23:24 Causa Sui – Sole Elettrico
29:00 Los Scallywags – Scattered
32:46 Yajaira – Se va la tómbola
38:00 Flying Moon In Space – The Observer (Radio Edit)
42:18 Herbcraft – III (pt. 2)
47:10 Pree Tone – Fifth O
52:21 Mienakunaru – (I) [excerpt]
This episode of Turn Me On, Dead Man features a good deal improvisational psych, with powerful tracks from Frozen Planet….1969, Population II and High Arctic, as well as atmospheric tracks from Herbcraft, Magic Cobra and Melody Fields, a little stoner/doom from Outer Head, and lo-fi guitar pop from Honey Radar. It opens with one of my all-time favorite bands, Magic Shoppe.
The title and breaks come from the 1978 Vietnam War epic The Deer Hunter. The cast of The Deer Hunter elevates what is otherwise a shallow, poorly thought out film. As Studs Turkel pointed out, “not since The Birth of a Nation has a non-Caucasian people been portrayed in so barbaric a fashion.” Still, De Niro. And even when he doesn’t make sense (“This is this”) the viewer is swept along by his intensity. “Is this what you want? Is this what you want? I love you. *click*”
[mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/turnmeondeadman/202016-this-is-this/ width=100% height=120 hide_cover=1]
00:00 TMODM – Intro
00:50 Magic Shoppe – On High Street (Live)
03:55 Herbcraft – Eon Rd
10:29 Magic Cobra – Golden Child
14:15 Frozen Planet….1969 – Rollback (Green Version)
19:15 Melody Fields – Broken Horse
22:47 Population II – Ce n’est Rêve
30:03 Honey Radar – Lilac Pharmacy
32:21 Outer Head – Left Hand Cult
38:32 High Arctic – First Trip
I recently watched In My Mind
[mixcloud https://www.mixcloud.com/turnmeondeadman/202015-the-new-number-2/ width=100% height=120 hide_cover=1]
00:00 TMODM – Intro
00:50 EarthOmen – Black Cloud Part I
05:42 Thee U.F.O. – Floating Eye
08:37 Spiral Wave Nomads – Ten Color Ritual
16:15 The Electric Myrrs – Witchy
20:21 black (w)hole – Psilosy
24:33 C.B. Kidd – Wishful Thinking
28:25 Sun of Man – Heavy Burn
32:45 Druggy Pizza – Radium Canyon
35:30 Burnt Hills – untitled (b3)
41:38 Minimal Bliss – Sunburst Eyes
46:50 Flying Anomaly Theorized – Fire in the Sky
54:40 EarthOmen – Black Cloud Part III
57:35 TMODM – Number 6 resigns
As the summer winds down, I’ve been listening to a lot of psychedelia. This summer has been strange but good in a lot of ways. At the top of the list is that we celebrated my son’s first birthday. He seems to enjoy it when I sing Beatles songs (even if no one else does!). But there is something I want him to know:
A lot of people don’t realize what’s really going on. They view life as a bunch of unconnected incidents and things. They don’t realize that there’s this, like, lattice of coincidence that lays on top of everything.
00:00 TMODM – Intro
00:44 Gloom Merchants – Kids and Their Children
05:50 Hyper Tensions – Solar Stare
07:55 TMODM – Plate o’ Shrimp
08:20 fuguers cove – Tanks/Flanks–>Bar Stool
11:01 Castle Club – Anybody Else
15:25 Excellent Skeleton – Stop Waking The Sun
25:00 TMODM – Time Machines
26:31 Prana Crafter – Chalice of the Fungal Sage
34:04 CCR Headcleaner – High Def
37:50 Martin Rude & Jakob Skøtt Duo – The Short Sun
40:22 TMODM – The More You Drive
40:42 Liquidacid – Scurry Release
46:36 White Manna – ARC
54:44 Lamp of the Universe – Beams of Ra
60:56 TMODM – One in every car
