Skip to: Content
Skip to: Site Navigation
Skip to: Search

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2009
| Subscribe to Newser's RSS feeds RSS | Follow Newser on Twitter Twitter


15

San Fran Returns to Its Psychedelic Roots

Not that any band there would say they knew of a scene

Share

(Newser) – San Francisco seems to have had something of a psychedelic rock resurgence, though don’t ask any of the bands involved to identify themselves that way. “People are so aware of everything and don't really separate it that much,” a man whose band has the telltale brooding drones tells the Guardian. "They mention modern hip-hop in the same sentence as old psych stuff or the Monkees or whatever.”

There’s also the question of a scene, which flourished in the '60s but seems fractured, if not absent, today. “I'm not a very social person,” the rocker continues. “If I have any tie with psychedelia, it's that I like transforming my pop songs into something that will take you off into another place.” That sounds about right. But even if the sound is the same, there’s no “deep philosophical meaning” to it, another musician says. People today “are just borrowing an aesthetic that's already there—a sound more than anything else.”

The Grateful Dead in 1965.
The Grateful Dead in 1965.   (Getty Images)
The Golden Gate Bridge frames the San Francisco skyline at dusk.
The Golden Gate Bridge frames the San Francisco skyline at dusk.   (AP Photo)
A tie-dye pattern.
A tie-dye pattern.   (Flickr)
« Prev« Prev | Next »Next » Slideshow

There's always music happening that's weirder and more experimental. Maybe it's improvised, or a bunch of noise, or has to do with crazy costumes and performance. But there's wildly disparate elements. - Ezra Feinberg, Citay

« Prev« Prev | Next »Next » Slideshow
15 comments
VIEWING:
 
Timinator2K
Sep 5, 09 9:49 AM CDT
SF, a once great city now awash and polluted with confrontational street people, the mentally ill and teen runaways every 10 feet on any given city street. Very tourist-friendly...not. Reply
Vote up! Vote down!
-3
IN RESPONSE:
Fondue
Sep 5, 09 9:56 AM CDT
When were you there last?
Vote up! Vote down!
+1
IN RESPONSE:
super_soft_wizard
Sep 5, 09 5:41 PM CDT
If by 'any given city street' you mean Haight Street and the Tenderloin... then yeah. The other 97% of The City? Few confrontational street people and teen runaways. Sorry that you limit your urban tourism to the tourist traps in which the street folk can easily shake you down. Bitchass.
Vote up! Vote down!
-1
LibertyMan
Sep 5, 09 10:02 AM CDT
Last week for me. Tim is absolutely correct. The land of fruits and nuts. Part of the Peoples Republic of California. You lefties and Democrats have screwed up forever what was once a paradise. Reply
Vote up! Vote down!
-7
IN RESPONSE:
Wraith
Sep 5, 09 12:15 PM CDT
You are a simple minded troll crossed with an idiot. Place the blame of the Left, is that your cure for all that doesn't fit within your life? Is this why your entire family is so unhappy with you? S.F. is a city built upon the bodies of the hidden dead from the 1906 earth quake, over 3,000 dead and probably much higher but the business people only allowed a very few to be counted so as not to discourage outside business investment thus a multitude of people were never counted..... The runaways, the homeless, and the street people have been there for over 80 years fool, the reason they are so visible is the courts have told the police to quit harassing and beating the homeless at random also the big business of the Hospitals dumping them in areas when the insurance runs out on a poor person, if that person happens to be mentally ill so be it they wander the streets of where the hospitals dumped them. You want to blame someone? Blame yourself, blame us all for forgetting the homeless, the ones mistreated and children who ran away to avoid abuse....Oh yea, it is always someone else fault and someone else problem. I got news for you, you are an American? Then it is your problem. You a Republican? Then your party is mainly to blame for putting GW Bush in and allowing him to destroy the economy placing people on the streets and that problem can't be repaired overnight and not in 1 years time especially since it took 8 years to destroy many years of hard work. It is all our problems and many of us face the same fate so get your head out your anus and get to work and quit crying like a little girl
Vote up! Vote down!
+3
LEAVE A
COMMENT
Comment Policy
Facebook ConnectPost this comment to Facebook?

After connecting you will have the option to post your comment on your Facebook profile.