Presented by Nigel Planer - who also did the Prog and Metal episodes of this series - Psychedelic Britannia tells the story of the years 1965 to 1970 as a group of bohemians led the charge to slowly psychedelicise Britain.
Obviously, it's the musicians that are prioritised here and there's some great old footage of, and new and archive interviews with members of Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Small Faces, Procol Harum, Soft Machine, The Incredible String Band, Vashti Bunyan, Arthur Brown and a host of others. The story tells of the move from R&B into more expansive territory, in part, due to the arrival of LSD and, in part due to a break from the rigid strictures of post-war Britain where the return to normality had begun to feel decidely restrictive and many were looking for new ways of life.
Beyond the musicians there's some fabulous old footage here of the likes of Granny Take a Trip, International Times, the UFO Club and the Alexandra Palace 14 Hour Technicolour Dream with commentary by those who were behind them and patronising them. It makes for a rather lovely glimpse of a unique and brief moment in British life before the optimism tarnished and the colours faded.
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So, as some of you know I spent much of the second half of last year pretty immobile due to numerous broken bones and the ensuing surgical procedures. Truth to say it wasn't a whole lot of fun. I was on quite a lot of morphine and as such watching films or reading books was out as I couldn't follow a plot and so I found myself staring at a lot of daytime TV - side note: not even morphine makes Jeremy Kyle any less noxious - and listening to copious amounts of music, so much in fact that I quickly ran out of what was to hand and so began searching around for new delights to do interesting things in my ears and my opiate addled brain.
Alan Moore
One of the things I stumbled across was the Buried Treasure label whose John Baker Vendetta Tapes became one of my most played albums of last year. In fact, if you check out my end of year list you'll find several Buried Treasure releases on there with several others not making the list simply due to numerical considerations. So it was with real excitement that I opened the promo copy sent by label honcho Alan Gubby of this, the first B.T. release of 2016 by psychedelic troubadours The Dandelion Set here ably assisted by one of the spiritual godfathers of what we do here at Wyrd Britain, Mr. Alan Moore.
Expectation, as we all know, can be a real bitch and I'd heard some Dandelion ditties on the recent B.T. comp, 'The Delaware Road', and I know now that Alan G. has an ear for the wonderful so this had a lot to live up to; an awful lot to live up to. We've all been down that road of getting all 'kid at xmas' about a new release only for it to turn out to be more of a 'kid at dentist' experience but now and again under the tree, wrapped in some beautifully psychedelic wrapping is that perfect gift and it surpasses all expectations.
From the opening moments of 'Pristina Strawberry Girl' we know that we're in for a trip of a ride as dreamy psyche-pop insinuates itself into the room before the wordy wizard of Northampton weaves a weirdy, wandering narrative over a skronking frug noir soundscape and so the scene is set.
Angular prog excursions make way for forays into the realms of opiated
French jazz pop. Playful dances of electronic fireflies throw
themselves through animated radiophonic swirls of psychedelic colour as tales of
love, loss, hopes, delusions and a trip to the cinema stand square, stark and
unflinching basking in the hallucinatory haze and calling you into this
twisting, writhing, mesmerising world. A technicolour playground of
lysergic intensity and intent filled with love and magic.
'A Thousand Strands 1975 - 2015' is released on 22nd April and Bandcamp pre-orders of the physical editions - LP / CD / Cassette - are sold out from the label - that's how good this album is - but will be available from an independent music supplier - shop independent and say no to tax avoiding multinationals - near you upon release.
Meanwhile here is a taster featuring the mighty Alan Moore, below that a video montage featuring live footage from 'The Delaware Road' launch gig and later this week you can hear a track on the next Wyrd Britain show on Mixcloud.
(Lotushouse Records LHRCD19)
CD
The first time I played
this CD I fell asleep. Not, you may think, the most auspicious first
impression but it was a very nice sleep indeed - what wasn't so good was
the bit where I woke up with my head slumped sideways over the arm of
the chair with the worst pain in my neck. The sleep though, was deep
and dark and profound. I'd got to about halfway through the album's 14
minute epic journey towards 'Infinity' and then I was gone. They'd
taken me with them, entirely.
What we have here is a UK
duo of Mark Pilkington on modular synth & electronics and Zali
Krishna on electric sitar & guitar who have produced a set of
intensely celestial kosmische jams; some live, some studio. The
occasional presence of the sitar means that a vaguely Indian aspect is
often shown (as is also implied by the bands name) but it is Germany of
the very early 1970s that is most apparent.
With a
running time of an hour and with a concise palate, many of the tracks,
once the music starts to permeate the room, do run into each other and
the whole becomes more important than it's parts as they paint a really
rather glorious psychotropic colourfield. There are moments I'm not
hugely enamoured with but even these parts often swirl by once it's
achieved consonance with the room (and my head) and they are few and far
between.
I've had this album here for just under a
week now and it has pretty much dominated my ears since it arrived with
the disc being carried from house to car and a rip sitting front and
centre on my MP3 player. If big, bold Krautrock inspired kosmische
excursions are your bag then really do hunt this down cause you'll love
it. If they're not, hunt this down anyway because it's great and it may
change your mind.
I'd had plenty of advice regarding 'A Field in England' before watching; watch it stoned, don't watch it stoned, watch it drunk, don't watch it drunk, watch it alone, with friends, late at night, turned slightly to the left, with one hand in wallpaper paste, etc, etc, etc. Way more advice in fact than opinions. Those tended to come along as fairly definite binary oppositions; "It's amazing!" or "It's awful!"
I've never been particularly good at taking advice though and being a typically arrogant zine writer or blogger or whatever we're called this week my own opinion is the only one that counts (that's not strictly true by the way - there're at least three other people whose opinions I tolerate). So, I waited till the time suited and dropped myself into Ben Wheatley's English field.
It's amazing!
Every shot is a beautiful thing as we follow our four - then five - Civil War era gentlemen as a man at the end of his rope meets a man at the end of his tether.
Reese Shearsmith as Whitehead
Cowardly alchemists apprentice Whitehead (Reese Shearsmith) is a man trying to live up to his 'responsibilities' to his master and locate some papers stolen by O'Neill (Michael Smiley). Along with two deserters - the pox riddled Jacob and the hapless (and very funny) Friend - they are 'guided' across the field by the brutal Cutler until they find O'Neill at the end of a very long rope.
From here on in as the psychedelic mushrooms forced onto the hapless trio by Cutler and O'Neill take them deeper down the rabbit hole the narrative begins to fracture at the same rate as their psyches. Magic, madness, mushrooms and mortality flow through each other until the tether holding Whitehead to his unwanted duty and the unfulfilling life it has brought him finally snaps.
Richard Glover as Friend
It isn't a perfect film. The sound is often muddy leaving much dialogue mired in a muffled gloop and the morphing visuals during the climax are a little hackneyed - but still fun. Like I said though it's beautiful to look at and often even fiercely brutal or bitingly funny. The ensemble cast are all at the top of their games and each entirely walks in their characters skins and whilst there's a part of me that thinks it wrong to point to any one actor in particular it is Richard Glover's fabulously understated Friend that really shone for me.
Finally, the soundtrack. So seamlessly woven through the narrative ambient soundscapes, folk songs sung direct to camera and incidental music that feels anything but. It is almost a character in it's own right so integral is it to the movie.
'A Field in England' is phenomenal achievement. For such a low key, undemonstrative and downright odd movie to be able to hold your attention so keenly whilst being quite so preposterous is absolutely to the credit and talent of all involved.
PS - In case you're wondering, I watched it at night, alone and sober but moving steadily towards drunk.
Contrary to popular belief, LSD is much more connected to Britain than it is to the US. This engaging book looks at the use of LSD in British society, from its arrival in 1952 to the present day. It provides a hidden history of a controversial drug and how it permeated British culture. The author explores LSD's use by the medical profession in treating a variety of psychological and mental problems. At the same time, The Ministry of Defense believed they were on the brink of harnessing LSD as a battlefield incapacitation drug which would enable wars to be won without loss of life. But LSD's popularity rose with its use among the British counterculture, from the 1950s beatniks through to the late 80s acid house parties. At its height, when it was legal, LSD affected the lives and philosophies of significant individuals (politicians, scientists, writers, educators, entertainers, artists, journalists) as well as ordinary people for good and bad. This book is the first to explore LSD's amazing influence on British culture and society.
The Jay Stevens book, Storming Heaven, is one of my favourite reads but it is very US centric so when I spotted a copy of this in the window of a Glastonbury bookshop I felt an immediate need to read.
It was a little disappointing. The writing is OK and the information interesting but there are blatant gaps in the narrative - not his fault as the records are blocked - which are frustrating and jarring and drag things down somewhat and after a while you start to wonder (possibly unfairly) if maybe he could have been a bit more rigorous in his research. More frustratingly though is that Roberts is blatantly evangelical regarding LSD. I prefer my authors to maintain a short of scholarly distance and simply relate the facts. I can make up my own mind and don't particularly enjoy being preached at.
That said though I still found much of interest here and it's definitely worth a read if it's your sort of subject matter.
