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Psych folk
Stylistic origins:	Electric folk, indie folk, Psychedelic rock
Cultural origins:	Late 1960s, early 1970s
Typical instruments:	Acoustic Guitar, Percussion
Mainstream popularity:
Derivative forms:	Neofolk

Psychedelic folk or Psych folk is a music genre that originated in the 1960s through the blending of folk music, Indie folk and psychedelic rock or pop.

Contents 1 Characteristics 2 History 3 List of psych folk artists 4 Related genres 5 See also 6 External links

Psych folk generally favors acoustic instrumentation although it often incorporates other instrumentation. Chanting, early music and world music influences are often found in psych folk. Much like its rock counterpart, psychedelic folk is known for a peculiar, trance-like, and atmospheric sound. Its lyrics are often concerned with such subjects as the natural world, love and beauty and try to evoke a state of mind associated with the effects of psychedelic drugs. However, drug associations are not as important to psych folk as they are to psychedelic rock.

Early Incredible String Band, Donovan, Fairport Convention, (see electric folk), Pentangle, Tyrannosaurus Rex, Synanthesia and perhaps most prominently, Syd Barrett are all prominent early examples of psych folk bands. Notice that all of these musicians are from Britain, where psychedelic music often had a stronger folk element.

American bands include early Byrds, Love, Bermuda Triangle Band, and Pearls Before Swine.

New musical artists continue to draw on this tradition, although many of them would not necessarily describe their own music as psych folk (the term "Freak Folk" has gained favor). Current 93 whose new folk direction of 1988’s Earth Covers Earth rekindled the acid/freak folk styles of such groups as the Incredible String Band. Indeed the album cover is a post-punk parody of the Incredible String Band’s seminal album, The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter. David Tibet, the main, and most consistent performer of Current 93 has continued predominantly with this style (his variation also called Apocalyptic folk) to this day while resurrecting the career of an original acid folk (and traditional folk) artist, Shirley Collins.

Since the 1990s, this style has included existentialist pairing Pinkie Maclure & John Wills, known as Pumajaw in Scotland. Also the Georgia-based Elephant 6 Recording Company, which includes bands like Neutral Milk Hotel, has been known to release psych folk records.

The latest generation of psych folk artists in the early to mid 2000s include Circulus, The Slant, Entrance, Devendra Banhart, Alela Diane, Alina Harden, Akron/Family, CocoRosie, Joanna Newsom,The Airy Fairy Gang (Ireland),Damien Youth, Lord Jeff, Jana Hunter, Espers, Vetiver, DeVotchKa, Faun Fables, Gwendolyn, Testface, Sun City Girls, Barefeet Pedlar, Dame Darcy, Gregory Paul, Kemialliset Ystävät (Finland), PG Six, William Wesley & The Tiny Sockets, Feathers, F.J.McMahon, Pothole Skinny, Seth Moore, Tower Recordings, Deek hoi, and Eyes and Arms of Smoke. (See New Weird America.)

Michael Gira has also assisted in a sort of psych folk revival. Gira may have named his newest project Angels of Light after San Francisco hippy Hibiscus' transcendental theatre group of the same name (Though another possible source of the name is the Psychic TV associated project "Thee Angels Ov Light Meet Thee Angry Love Orchestra". in interviews he says he cannot remember where he got the name from) and is responsible for guiding the career of new psych folk stars, Devendra Banhart and Akron/Family. Julien Aklei is an underground psych folk luminary, giving the genre a fresh and lighthearted color with her fairy-pastel point of view.

One of the best examples of this type of music is "Cosmic Charlie" by the Grateful Dead.

• Animal Collective
• Beulah
• Brightblack Morning Light
• Devendra Banhart
• Comets on Fire
• CocoRosie
• Deadboy & the Elephantmen
• Elf Power
• The Gris Gris
• Grizzly Bear
• Hala Strana
• A Hawk and a Hacksaw
• The Ladybug Transistor
• Lilys
• Joanna Newsom
• Oranger
• Outrageous Cherry
• Plasticland
• Patrick Porter
• Scorched Earth
• Adrian Shaw
• The Skygreen Leopards

As mentioned, a related style that incorporates world music, strange sounds, and trippy lyrics is psych folk's more esoteric-oriented and hermetic-centered cousin, Apocalyptic folk. While these genres are similar, the latter's sound and history owes a debt to Gothic rock and early industrial music.

• Freak folk
• Naturalismo
• Anti-folk
• Ptolemaic Terrascope - a psychedelic folk & rock magazine
• Galen Pehrson - Galen Pehrson -- Psychedelic folk Artist and Director
• Mellow Candle
• Neofolk
• New Weird America - A modern American psych-folk movement

• Hippedelic Records - Selling Rare Psychedelic Vinyls
• The Psychedelic & Acid Folk Music Site from Psych Van Het Folk
• Dream Magazine -- great resource for psych folk and all other types of psychedelic music
• Psych folk list on Amazon
• Contemporary Psychedelia: From Transcendence to Immanence -- An essay on psych folk and spirituality

v • d • e Folk music
Anti-folk - Celtic music - Counterfolk - Electric folk - Filk music - Folk metal - Folk punk - Folk rock - Folktronica - Neofolk - Nu-folk - Pop folk - Psych folk - Roots revival - Traditional music - Urban Folk - Narodna muzika - Progressive folk
Festivals - Folk dance - Folk clubs - Instruments - Protest song - Record labels - Singer-songwriter - Lists of traditions - World music
American folk - English folk - Ethnic Macedonian folk - Filipino folk - French folk - Greek folk - Hungarian folk - Icelandic folk - Indian folk - Italian folk - Iranian folk - Turkish folk - Ukrainian folk - Middle Eastern music