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Mind-bending: songs with psychedelic sounds

December 14, 2023 Peter Kimpton

Psych is always on the move …

Delay, fuzz, distortion, flanger, echo, sitars, and mind-altering drugs? It’s a style chiefly associated with the late-60s but what are it’s key characteristics and where else do they come up in the world of music? Let’s go on a journey through time and space …

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In avant-garde, blues, dance, electronica, drone, experimental, folk, funk, indie, hip hop, instrumentals, jazz, krautrock, metal, music, playlists, pop, postpunk, prog, psychedelia, punk, rock, soul, soundtracks Tags songs, playlists, psychedelia, Aldous Huxley, Harry Nilsson, Hunter S. Thompson, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Film, film soundtrack, psychology, hallucingens, drugs, Humphry Osmond, books, Michael Hicks, Timothy Leary, William Blake, Hector Berlioz, Claude Debussy, art, Jean Moréas, Musique Concréte, Edgard Varèse, The Beatles, Frank Zappa, Silver Apples, Yma Sumac, Les Baxter, Juan García Esquivel, Beatnik, poetry, William Burroughs, Alan Watts, Jack Kerouac, Ken Kesey, Arthur Koestler, Tom Wolfe, Allen Ginsberg, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, The Doors, The 13th Floor Elevators, Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, Sly & The Family Stone, The Delfonics, Jake Holmes, Syd Barrett, Marc Bolan, Tim Buckley, Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno, Vangelis, The Stone Roses, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, John Hopkins, Animal Collective
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Think different: songs about using your imagination

February 23, 2023 Peter Kimpton

Vladmir Kush’s African Sonata

From practical life problems, work, relationships, craft or crisis, to all sorts of creative problems, or even channelling dreams, it’s time to access the right hemisphere and see how the imagination can be used, as expressed in song lyrics. Read on for more stimulation …

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In African, avant-garde, blues, calypso, classical, comedy, country, dance, disco, drone, dub, electronica, experimental, folk, funk, gospel, hip hop, indie, instrumentals, jazz, metal, music, musical hall, musicals, playlists, pop, postpunk, prog, psychedelia, punk, reggae, rock, rocksteady, showtime, ska, songs, soul, soundtracks, traditional Tags songs, playlists, psychology, the brain, William Shakespeare, Shakespeare, Albert Einstein, Michelangelo, Pablo Picasso, John Keats, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Norman Vincent Peale, Jimi Hendrix, Tom Waits, Taylor Swift, Dr Seuss, Dolly Parton, Brian Eno, Ada Lovelace, Hedy Lamarr, Doris Day, Suzi Quatro, Hilary Mantel, Neil Gaiman, Vladimir Nabokov, Simone Weil, Frank Lloyd Wright, GK Chesterton, Bryan Cranston, Christian Bale, Malcolm Gladwell, evolution, animals
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Gut instinct? Songs about the sixth sense

February 3, 2022 Peter Kimpton

Cross my palm with song suggestions, and I see a future where there will be wonderful new playlists …

Do we have one, or is it fake? Both. But either way, this week’s theme, inspired by approaching the Song Bar’s Sixth Birthday as all about intuition, a gut instinct, a feeling in your bones, notions of unknown source, sensing something without knowing why

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In African, avant-garde, blues, calypso, classical, comedy, country, dance, disco, drone, dub, electronica, experimental, folk, funk, gospel, hip hop, indie, instrumentals, jazz, metal, music, musical hall, playlists, musicals, pop, postpunk, prog, punk, reggae, rock, rocksteady, showtime, songs, ska, soul, soundtracks, traditional Tags sixth sense, perception, psychology, physionomy, Amit Kalantri, Albert Einstein, Holbrook Jackson, Arthur Conan Doyle, Bill Hicks, animals, animal behaviour, dogs, cats, birds, Jane Goodall, third eye, Amy Leigh Mercree, George Harrison, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Henry Reed, David Bowie, Sia, Arlo Parks, Brian May, Flea, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, David Lynch, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Alan Turing, Malcolm Gladwell, Johann Kaspar Lavater, psychics, clairvoyance, Uri Geller, Guillermo del Toro, William Lindsay Gresham, M Lamar Keene, Cyril Henry Hoskin, The Sixth Sense, Film, books
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Notes on the new normal: songs about what is or isn't regular, typical or natural

November 26, 2020 Peter Kimpton
We’re normal … The Bonzos

We’re normal … The Bonzos

Regular? Standard? Stereotype? Average? Typical? Natural? What does normal mean, and how might it be explored in song lyrics? From people to behaviour, families to jobs to towns, and any other context, it’s all a matter of perspective

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In African, avant-garde, blues, calypso, classical, comedy, country, dance, disco, dub, electronica, experimental, folk, funk, gospel, hip hop, indie, jazz, metal, music, musical hall, musicals, playlists, pop, postpunk, prog, punk, reggae, rock, rocksteady, showtime, ska, songs, soul, soundtracks, traditional Tags songs, playlists, the new normal, normality, Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band, NIcki Minaj, Sigmund Freud, Jo Brand, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Mitch Hedberg, Star Trek, George Takei, Edward Furlong, Terminator, Arnold Schwarzenegger, The Addams Family, Grace Jones, Whoopi Goldberg, Tayla Parx, River Phoenix, Sia, Kate Bush, Nick Cave, Yo-Yo Ma, Lykke Li, George Herbert Mead, PJ O'Rourke, Roddy Doyle, Michel Foucault, Kevin Sorbo, Orson Welles, Rosa Parks, naturism, Glory Pearl, Glen Donnelly, The Slits
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Late goals: striking song and album endings

June 14, 2018 Peter Kimpton
Sunset ending? Not every ride goes so smoothly …

Sunset ending? Not every ride goes so smoothly …

No – it’s not the World Cup. This week we’re looking at all kinds of ends of albums and other songs – from surprising, sudden, or summing up, to those that are ambiguous, serious, comical or take us to a new place

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In blues, classical, comedy, country, dance, electronica, folk, instrumentals, jazz, metal, music, musicals, punk, reggae, playlists, pop, postpunk, ska, songs, soundtracks Tags Songs, playlists, endings, albums, Film, books, death, Julian Barnes, Margaret Atwood, Orson Welles, Arthur Miller, Jim Morrison, The Doors, Dylan Thomas, poetry, relationships, Stephen King, George RR Martin, Game of Thrones, Samuel R Delany, Friedrich Nietzsche, Frank R Baum, The Wizard of Oz, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Joseph Conrad, Truman Capote, George Orwell, JD Salinger, Haruki Murakami, James Joyce, William Shakespeare, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Blake's 7, The Sopranos, Journey, Casablanca, Alejandro Jodorowsky, John Lennon, Mel Brooks, Blazing Saddles, Buster Keaton
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My log saw something … songs about the strange, disturbing and surreal

April 27, 2017 Peter Kimpton
Time to log on …

Time to log on …

Log Lady to Blue Velvet, Beefheart and fantasy fish, doppelgängers and all-seeing owls, this week we delve in an alternative world where lyrics and music capture an area between dream and reality

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Tags Songs, Surrealism, Dada, Twin Peaks, David Lynch, Rene Magritte, John Lennon, Salvador Dali, David Bowie, Mark Frost, television, Film, film soundtrack, Andre Breton, art, poetry, lyrics, owls, animals, William Burroughs, books, Tristan Tzara, Blue Velvet, Lost Highway, Silver Jews, The Killers, Robbie Williams, Captain Beefheart, The Black Eyes Peas, The Beatles, Oasis, Noel Gallagher, The Who, Pete Townshend, The Teardrop Explodes, Echo and the Bunnymen, Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians, Monsters and Men, Barnes & Barnes, Meret Oppenheim, Dorothea Tanning, Kikuji Yamashita, Alejandro Jodorowsky
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Brave, brilliant or embarrassing? ‘Uncharacteristic’ genre-switch songs

February 16, 2017 Peter Kimpton
Jump, they say. But where next? David Bowie

Jump, they say. But where next? David Bowie

Rock band does reggae? Punk band goes country? Rapper does jazz? This week we explore genre-switching or surprise moments in artists’ careers that confounded fans’ expectations

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Tags Songs, genres, rock, reggae, hip hop, jazz, metal, folk, indie, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Youssou N'Dour, music industry, Kate Bush, Tom Waits, Kevin Ayers, Miles Davis, Robert Wyatt, Julian Cope, Anthony Newley, comedy, Peter Gabriel, Genesis, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Film, James Dean, John Berryman, poetry, Madonna, Lady Gaga, Kenny Rogers, Coen Brothers, The Bee Gees, Iggy Pop, Fleetwood Mac, Johnny Cash, Katy Perry, Christianity, religion, Bjork, punk, The Sugarcubes, Beastie Boys, Belinda Carlisle, The Go-Go's, Plan B, Blue Note, Kevin Rowland, Lana Del Ray, Radiohead, Pixies, Dizzee Rascal, The Black Eyes Peas, Fugees, Snoop Dogg, Joni Mitchell, This is Spinal Tap, Róisín Murphy, The Big Lebowski
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Sing out, act on CLIMATE CHANGE

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CONDEMN RACISM, EMBRACE EQUALITY


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DRINK OF THE WEEK

Napue dark gin


SNACK OF THE WEEK

crudités platter


New Albums …

Featured
Devotion & The Black Divine by anaiis.jpeg
Dec 2, 2025
anaiis: Devotion & The Black Divine
Dec 2, 2025

New album: Following a summer Song of the Day - Deus Deus, a review of the autumn release and third LP by the London-based French-Senegalese singer-songwriter of resonantly beautiful, dynamic, sensual soul, gospel, R&B and experimental and chamber pop, with themes of new motherhood, uncertainty, religion, self-love and acceptance

Dec 2, 2025
De La Soul - Cabin In The Sky.jpeg
Nov 26, 2025
De La Soul: Cabin In The Sky
Nov 26, 2025

New album: The hip-hop veterans return with their first without, yet including the voice of, and a tribute to, founding member Trugoy the Dove, AKA Dave Jolicoeur who passed away in 2023, alongside many hip-hop luminary guests, with trademark playful skits, and all themed around the afterlife

Nov 26, 2025
The Mountain Goats- Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan.jpeg
Nov 26, 2025
The Mountain Goats: Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan
Nov 26, 2025

New album: An evocative musical journey of a concept album by the indie-folk band from Claremont, California, fronted by singer-songwriter John Darnielle, based on a dream of his in 2023 about a voyage to a fictional island by the titular captain, charting adventure, wonder and tragedy

Nov 26, 2025
Allie X - Happiness Is Going To Get You.jpeg
Nov 26, 2025
Allie X: Happiness Is Going To Get You
Nov 26, 2025

New album: A hugely entertaining, witty, droll, inventive, chamber and synth-pop fourth LP with a goth twist by the charismatic and theatrical Canadian artist Alexandra Hughes, who brings paradox and dark themes through sounds that include string quartet, harpsichord, classical and pure pop piano with killer lyrics

Nov 26, 2025
Tortoise - Touch.jpeg
Nov 25, 2025
Tortoise: Touch
Nov 25, 2025

New album: A welcome return with a cinematic and mesmeric groove-filled first studio LP in nine years, and the eighth over all by the eclectic Chicago post-rock/jazz/krautrock multi-instrumentalists Dan Bitney, John Herndon, Douglas McCombs, John McEntire and Jeff Parker

Nov 25, 2025
What of Our Nature by Haley Heynderickx, Max García Conover.jpeg
Nov 24, 2025
Haley Heynderickx and Max García Conover: What of Our Nature
Nov 24, 2025

New album: Beautiful, precise, poignant and poetic new folk numbers inspired by the life and music style of Woody Guthrie as the Portland, Oregon and New Yorker, now Portland, Maine-based singer-songwriters bring a delicious duet album, alternating and sharing songs covering a variety of forever topical social issues

Nov 24, 2025
Tranquilizer by Oneohtrix Point Never.jpeg
Nov 24, 2025
Oneohtrix Point Never: Tranquilizer
Nov 24, 2025

New album: Ambient, otherworldly, cinematic, mesmeric, and at times very odd, the Brooklyn-based electronic artist and producer Daniel Lopatin returns with a new nostalgia-based concept – constructing tracks from lost-then-refound Y2K CDs of 1990s and early 2000s royalty-free sample electronic sounds

Nov 24, 2025
Iona Zajac - Bang.jpeg
Nov 24, 2025
Iona Zajac: Bang
Nov 24, 2025

New album: A powerful, stirring, passionate and mature debut LP by the 29-year-old Glasgow-based Scottish singer with Polish and Ukrainian heritage who has toured as the new Pogues singer, and whose alternative folk songs capture raw emotions and the experience of modern womanhood, with echoes of PJ Harvey, Patti Smith, Aldous Harding and Lankum

Nov 24, 2025
Austra - Chin Up Buttercup.jpeg
Nov 19, 2025
Austra: Chin Up Buttercup
Nov 19, 2025

New album: This fifth studio LP as Austra by the Canadian classically trained vocalist and composer Katie Stelmanis brings beautiful electronica-pop and dance music, and has a bittersweet ironic title – a caustically witty reference to societal pressure to keep smiling despite a devastating breakup

Nov 19, 2025
Mavis Staples - Sad and Beautiful World.jpeg
Nov 18, 2025
Mavis Staples: Sad and Beautiful World
Nov 18, 2025

New album: A timelessly classy release by the veteran soul, blues and gospel singer and social activist from the Staples Singers, in a release of wonderfully moving and poignant cover versions, beautifully interpreting works by artists including Tom Waits, Curtis Mayfield, Leonard Cohen, and Gillian Welch

Nov 18, 2025
Stella Donnelly - Love and Fortune 2.jpeg
Nov 18, 2025
Stella Donnelly: Love and Fortune
Nov 18, 2025

New album: Finely crafted, stripped back musical simplicity combined with complex melancholic emotions mark out this beautiful, poetic, and deeply personal third folk-pop LP by the Australian singer-songwriter reflecting on the past and present

Nov 18, 2025
picture-parlour-the-parlour-album.jpeg
Nov 17, 2025
Picture Parlour: The Parlour
Nov 17, 2025

New album: Following last year’s EP Face in the Picture, a fabulously stylish, smart, swaggering glam-rock-pop debut LP by the Manchester-formed, London-based band fronted by the impressively raspy, gritty, vibratro delivery of Liverpudlian vocalist and guitarist Katherine Parlour and distinctive riffs from North Yorkshire-born guitar Ella Risi

Nov 17, 2025
FKA twigs - Eusexua Afterglow.jpeg
Nov 16, 2025
FKA twigs: EUSEXUA Afterglow
Nov 16, 2025

New album: Springing from her much lauded third LP Eusexua, out in January this year, and following a hugely successful and spectacular tour, the innovative British experimental pop artist, dancer and producer extends her palette of ethereal, otherworldly and sensual creations in this new, more carnal, harder, beat-filled parallel release

Nov 16, 2025
Celeste - Woman of Faces.jpg
Nov 15, 2025
Celeste: Woman of Faces
Nov 15, 2025

New album: The outstanding British singer returns, a long four years after her acclaimed debut Not Your Muse, with a classy, passionate set of nine, simmering, smoky, rippling dramatic, timeless numbers in which her vocal prowess is magnificently on show on songs playing on the theme of self and identity

Nov 15, 2025

new songs …

Featured
The Lemon Twigs - I've Got A Broken Heart.jpeg
Dec 4, 2025
Song of the Day: The Lemon Twigs - I've Got A Broken Heart
Dec 4, 2025

Song of the Day: Despite the title, this new double-A single (with Friday I’m Gonna Love You) has a wonderfully uplifting guitar-jangling beauty, with echoes of The Byrds and Stone Roses, but is of course the brilliant 60s and 70s retro sound of the Long Island brothers Brian and Michael D'Addario, out on Captured Tracks

Dec 4, 2025
Alewya - Night Drive.jpeg
Dec 3, 2025
Song of the Day: Alewya - Night Drive (featuring Dagmawit Ameha)
Dec 3, 2025

Song of the Day: A sensual, stylish, dreamy electro-pop single by the striking British singer-songwriter, producer, multidisciplinary artist and model Alewya Demmisse, musically influenced by her rich Ethiopian-Egyptian heritage and early childhood upbringings in Saudi Arabia and Sudan

Dec 3, 2025
Rule 31 Single Artwork.jpg
Dec 2, 2025
Song of the Day: Radio Free Alice - Rule 31
Dec 2, 2025

Song of the Day: Stirring, passionate indie postpunk by the band based in Melbourne, Australia, with echoes of The Cure’s core sound, new wave, and 90s indie-rock influences, and out on Double Drummer

Dec 2, 2025
Sailor Honeymoon - Armchair.jpeg
Dec 1, 2025
Song of the Day: Sailor Honeymoon - Armchair
Dec 1, 2025

Song of the Day: Catchy, punchy, fuzz-guitar indie rock with a droll lyrical delivery and some echoes of Wet Leg come in this new single by the trio from Seoul, South Korea, out on Good Good Records

Dec 1, 2025
Ellie O'Neill.jpeg
Nov 30, 2025
Song of the Day: Ellie O'Neill - Bohemia
Nov 30, 2025

Song of the Day: A beautiful, poetic finger-picking debut folk single with a mystical, distantly stormy twist by the Dublin-based Irish singer-songwriter from County Meath, out now on St Itch Records

Nov 30, 2025
Danalogue.jpeg
Nov 29, 2025
Song of the Day: Danalogue - Sonic Hypnosis
Nov 29, 2025

Song of the Day: A full flavour of future-past with mesmeric, euphoric retro acid house and electronica in this new single by Daniel Leavers, producer and the founding member of The Comet Is Coming and Soccer96, out now on Castles In Space

Nov 29, 2025
Cardinals band.jpeg
Nov 28, 2025
Song of the Day: Cardinals - Barbed Wire
Nov 28, 2025

Song of the Day: Another striking, passionate, punchy, catchy single by the Irish postpunk/indie-folk-rock band from Cork, heralding their upcoming debut album, Masquerade, out on 13 February via So Young Records

Nov 28, 2025
Frank-Popp-Ensemble and Paul Weller.jpeg
Nov 27, 2025
Song of the Day: Frank Popp Ensemble (with Paul Weller) - Right Before My Eyes
Nov 27, 2025

Song of the Day: A strong, soaring, emotive, soulful release by the German artist co-written by British singer and former Jam frontman who here sings and plays guitar, the lyrics about witnessing the increasing injustices and demise of the world, out on Unique Records / Schubert Music Europe

Nov 27, 2025
Tessa Rose Jackson - Fear Bangs The Drum 2.jpeg
Nov 26, 2025
Song of the Day: Tessa Rose Jackson - Fear Bangs The Drum
Nov 26, 2025

Song of the Day: Using a musical metaphor, beautiful, crisply rhythmical, soaring piano and atmospheric indie-pop-folk about facing your fears by the Dutch/British singer-songwriter, heralding her forthcoming new album The Lighthouse, out on 23 January 2026 on Tiny Tiger Records

Nov 26, 2025
Melanie Baker - Sad Clown.jpeg
Nov 25, 2025
Song of the Day: Melanie Baker - Sad Clown
Nov 25, 2025

Song of the Day: Catchy, candid, cathartic indie-grunge-pop by the British singer-songwriter from Cumbria in a melancholy but oddly uplifting emotional work-through of depression, love and exhaustion, out now on TAMBOURHINOCEROS

Nov 25, 2025
Holly Humberstone - Die Happy.jpeg
Nov 24, 2025
Song of the Day: Holly Humberstone - Die Happy
Nov 24, 2025

Song of the Day: Luxuriant, breathy, femme-fatale dream pop with a dark, southern gothic, Lana del Rey-inspired, live-fast-die-young theme, and stylish video by the 25-year-old British singer-songwriter from Grantham, out on Polydor/Universal

Nov 24, 2025
These New Puritans brothers.jpg
Nov 23, 2025
Song of the Day: These New Puritans - The Other Side
Nov 23, 2025

Song of the Day: A delicate, tender, and unusually minimalist single, their first since this year’s acclaimed album Crooked Wing, by the Southend-on-Sea-born Barnett twins, here with Jack on improvised piano and George on drums and a soprano register wordless vocal, out on Domino Records

Nov 23, 2025

Word of the week

Featured
Hangover.jpeg
Dec 4, 2025
Word of the week: crapulence
Dec 4, 2025

Word of the week: A term that may apply regularly during Xmas party season, from the from the Latin crapula, in turn from the Greek kraipálē meaning "drunkenness" or "headache" pertains to sickness symptoms caused by excess in eating or drinking, or general intemperance and overindulgence

Dec 4, 2025
Running shoes and barefoot.jpeg
Nov 20, 2025
Word of the week: discalceate
Nov 20, 2025

Word of the week: A rarely used, but often practised verb, especially when arriving home, it means to take off your shoes, but is also a slightly more common adjective meaning barefoot or unshod, particularly for certain religious orders that wear sandals instead of shoes. But in what context does this come up in song?

Nov 20, 2025
autumn-red-leaves.jpeg
Nov 6, 2025
Word of the week: erythrophyll
Nov 6, 2025

Word of the week: A seasonally topical word relating to the the red pigment of tree leaves, fruits and flowers, that appears particularly when changing in autumn, as opposed to the green effect of chlorophyll, from the Greek erythros for red, and phyll for leaves. But what of songs about this?

Nov 6, 2025
Fennec fox 2.jpeg
Oct 22, 2025
Word of the week: fennec
Oct 22, 2025

Word of the week: It’s a small pale-fawn nocturnal fox with unusually large, highly sensitive ears, that inhabits from African and Arab deserts areas from Western Sahara and Mauritania to the Sinai Peninsula. But has it ever been seen in a song?

Oct 22, 2025
Narrowboat.jpeg
Oct 9, 2025
Word of the week: gongoozler
Oct 9, 2025

Word of the week: A fabulous old English slang term for someone who tends to stand or sit for long periods staring at the passing of boats on canals, sometimes with a derogatory or at least ironic use for someone who is useless or lazy. But what of songs about this activity and culture?

Oct 9, 2025

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