Welcome back to Psychobabble's Psychedelic 500, in which I count my personal fave psych songs from 500 all the way down to #1! Today, let's see what's 2000 light years from home from 200 to 176...
200. The Beatles- "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" (1967), in which John Lennon takes full advantage of all the grey areas in circus-poster copyright law.
199. The Who- "Disguises" (1966), in which The Who celebrate their first 100% psychedelic outing with a nostril solo.
198. Paul Revere and the Raiders- "I Hear a Voice" (1967), in which I'm pretty sure Mark Lindsay intends to raise his girlfriend from the dead.
197. The Beatles- "The Inner Light" (1968), in which George Harrison takes full advantage of all the grey areas in Warring States-period Taoist-text copyright law.
196. The Zombies- "Maybe After He's Gone" (1968), in which The Zombies, as gently as possible, long for their ex-girlfriend's current boyfriend to drop dead.
195. Pete Townshend- "Goin' Fishing" (1968), in which Pete Townshend channels Smiley Smile-era Beach Boys to address his hatred of skewering live fish on hooks.
194. The Pretty Things- "She Says Good Morning" (1968), in which S.F. Sorrow meets his doomed future-girlfriend and the person who did the stereo mix of S.F. Sorrow thinks it's a good idea to pan nothing but a single snare drum into the righthand channel.
193. The Who- "I Can See for Miles" (1967), in which Pete Townshend has his biggest U.S. hit ever and is disappointed.
192. The Jimi Hendrix Experience- "Purple Haze" (1967), in which you can just get that look off your face because I placed Hendrix's signature song so low on Psychobabble's Psychedelic 500! There's plenty more Hendrix to come, smarty pants.
191. The Chambers Brothers- "Time Has Come Today" (1967), in which the only listenable song on the first Chambers Brothers album is so good it made the Top 200 of Psychobabble's Psychedelic 500!
190. The Turtles- "Grim Reaper of Love" (1966), in which The Turtles sing about the guy The Zombies seem to want to get to work back at number #199 on Psychobabble's Psychedelic 500!
189. The Jimi Hendrix Experience- "1983... (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)/Moon Turn the Tides... Gently, Gently Away" (1968), in which Hendrix conjures a staggeringly psychedelic medley that is so impossible to separate into its constituent parts that we can unabashedly claim two Hendrix's tracks for the price of one right here at number #204 on Psychobabble's Psychedelic 500!
188. Cream- "Passing the Time" (1968), in which Cream keep the spacey side spacey and the pounding side pounding.
187. Cream- "Anyone for Tennis" (1968), in which dogmatic blues purist Eric Clapton sings some twee psych about how skeptical he is of the whole twee-psych thing.
186. Nazz- "If That's the Way You Feel" (1968), in which I invite you to hear an almost outrageously pretty song.
185. The Moody Blues- "Departure/Ride My See-Saw" (1968), in which the doggerel that usually makes Moody Blues albums insufferable makes their rockingest track even more rocking when it gradually gets crazier and crazier until... boom!... the Moodys' best guitar lick!
184. Donovan- "Atlantis" (1969), in which the doggerel that would make Donovan albums insufferable if he indulged in such things makes his most Hey Judest track even more awesome when it gradually gets more and more Donovany until... boom!... "Way doooooown below the ocean! Wheeeere I wanna be, she may be!"
183. David Bowie- "The Man Who Sold the World" (1970), in which Bowie writes his second stone-cold classic and most people don't notice until Kurt Cobain sings it.
182. Cream- "Tales of Brave Ulysses" (1967), in which Jack Bruce is singing "you see a girl's brown body dancing through the turquoise" and not "you see a girl's gross body dancing through the kumquats" like I thought he was when I was sixteen.
181. The End- "What Does It Feel Like?" (1969), in which The End act like it's some big deal to live to one hundred because people usually didn't do that type of thing in the sixties but they do it all the time now. Way to go, science.
180. Small Faces- "The Hungry Intruder" (1968), in which Happiness Stan shares his shepherd's pie with a talking fly.
179. The Jimi Hendrix Experience- "House Burning Down" (1968), in which Hendrix gets righteously sad over the more destructive side of righteous protest.
178. Pink Floyd- "Paint Box" (1968), in which Pink Floyd show that one dismisses their abilities as a singles act at the risk of their own credibility, even if that dismisser is Pink Floyd, themselves.
177. Simon & Garfunkel- "You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies" (1967), in which a couple of white boys from New York explore the psychedelic possibilities of ska with one hand and wag their finger at you with the other.
176. Traffic- "Paper Sun" (1967), in which Traffic sound perfectly merry even though the consequences of the sun transforming from a gas-based body into a paper-based one are cataclysmic in the extreme.
Trip on to #175-151... (COMING SOON)
...Flashback to #225-201
