Indie

Psychedelic music emerged in the mid-60s as a mutant offspring of the British Invasion and American garage rock, but has since morphed into so many different forms that it is more accurate to describe it as a feeling than a sound. Be it the the brain-melting feedback of Jimi Hendrix or Ty Segall, the dreamy reveries of Spiritualized and Tame Impala, or the heady, head-nodding beats of Flying Lotus and J Dilla, psychedelica is hard to pin down—but you’ll know you’re hearing it when you feel your mind altering. Heres our curated guide to the best head music to help you chase the rush, including our genre-spanning psych playlist (at right) and links to past Dowsers mixes for even deeper trips.

INDIE PSYCHPsychedelia never dies, it just keeps getting weirder. Animal Collective threw down the gauntlet with 2004’s Sung Tongs, their childlike, free-spirited update of psych rock, and a generation of indie artists have taken up the challenge. From Deerhunters fearsome ambient punk to Zombys scrambled dubstep to Ariel Pinks wounded daydreams, the youngest generation continues to push music inward.Recommended Listening:Animal Collective’s Outer LimitsDreamy Noise Sounds: The Best of Kranky RecordsNew Tropics: The Modern Los Angeles Underground

PSYCH PUNKThe common myth about punk is that it formed in opposition to bloated 70s rock, and rejected Pink Floyd and anything associated with psychedelia. But the truth is that plenty of punks, such as restless hardcore purveyors Black Flag and volatile noiseniks the Butthole Surfers, not to mention punk-adjacent acts like the Jesus & Mary Chain and Dinosaur Jr., looked back to the ‘60s when deciding how to expand their sound and beguile their fans.Recommended Listening:When Punk Got WeirdPsychedelia in the ‘80sThe 50 Best Shoegaze Albums of All Time

PSYCH FOLKIn the beginning, psychedelic music was associated with guitar gods like Jimi Hendrix and waves of feedback. But that big bang was soon followed by generations of artists—from 60s Greenwich Village folkie Karen Dalton to Bert Jansch and his 70s British folk group Pentangle to modern dreamweavers like Devendra Banhart— who used acoustic guitars, pared-down arrangements, and dexterously plucked melodies to pull the listener into their headspace without the need for amplification.Recommended Listening:Way Past Pleasant: A Guide to Psychedelic FolkReligion, Rock, and LSD: A Brief History of Jesus Freaks

PSYCH ROCKWhen rock first got psychedelic in the 60s, the most obvious proponents were self-professed freaks like Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa. But nearly everywhere you looked, you could find someone trying to access their inner mind via some radical noise, from cult acts like Love and The Fugs to icons like The Beatles and Pink Floyd. Since then, every generation since has found their own way to look inside, from the Dream Syndicate in the ’80s, to Slowdive in the ’90s, to My Morning Jacket in the 21st century.Recommended Listening:Bad Trips: The Dark Side of the ‘60sSpace Rock: A Cosmic JourneyHow Psychedelia Reclaimed Modern Rock

PSYCH JAZZAt its mid-’60s moment of origin, psychedelia immediately found a natural host in jazz. After all, both are concerned with evoking a feeling and a mood, and following inspiration wherever it leads—from the spiritually searching compositions of Alice Coltrane to Mulatu Astatke’ slippery Latin-flavored explorations to Flying Lotus dedication to feeding brains with jazz-damaged trance whispers.Recommended Listening:The Black Experimental Music MixtapeChampions of Ethiopian GrooveThe Best of Brainfeeder

PSYCH FUNKPsychedelic music has traditionally been used as a way to explore the inner workings of your mind. But if you take off the headphones, its also a great way to explore your body on the dance floor. Soul, funk and R&B have a long tradition of making music that rocks the hips and the third eye at the same time, from Eddie Hazels righteous riffing on Funkadelic’s Cosmic Slop to Dâm-Funks alien synth-funk bangers.Recommended Listening:A Deeper Shade of Psych SoulThe Afrofuturist Impulse in MusicInto the Nite: Synth-Funk Fantasias

PSYCH RAPPsychedelic music has drifted into every form of music, and since any worthwhile hip-hop producer keeps their ears open, its only natural that it’s became part of the mix. Revered producers J Dilla and Madlib have made hip-hop tracks that oozed with so much mood and shimmer that they didnt even need MCs to rewire the listeners brain, while the genre’s heady offshoot, trip-hop, has been obliterating genre lines and listeners’ minds for more than two decades.Recommended Listening:Great (Post-Donuts) Instrumental Hip-Hop TracksBehind the Beats: Madlib and DillaBest Trip-Hop Tracks

PSYCH-TRONICAWhy settle for rocking minds and rocking bodies when you can do both at once? From the Chemical Brothers to Neon Indian to Boards of Canada, many of the most cutting-edge electronic-music producers spend equal amounts of time focussing on booming beats as well as keyboard lines, sine moans, and digital gurgles designed to tickle the mind. And if you need to rest after a night out, theres plenty of trippy ambient chillout tracks for that as well.Recommended Listening:Essential Acid House TraxThe Art of Psychedelic Disco-RockThe Best Electronic Shoegaze

The ’90s have never sounded better than they do right now—especially for modern-day indie rockers. There’s no shortage of bands banging around these days whose sound suggests formative phases spent soaking up vintage ’90s indie rock. Not that the neo-’90s sound is itself a new thing. As soon as the era was far enough away in the rearview mirror to allow for nostalgia to set in (i.e., the second half of the 2000s), there were already some young artists out there onboarding ’90s alt-rock influences. But more recently, there’s been a bumper crop of bands that betray a soft spot for a time when MTV still played music videos and streaming was just something that happened in a restroom. In this context, the literate, lo-fi approach of Pavement has emerged as a particularly strong strand of the ’90s indie tapestry, and it isn’t hard to hear echoes of their sound in the work of more recent arrivals like Kiwi jr. or Teenage Cool Kids. Cherry Glazerr frontwoman Clementine Creevy seems to have a feeling for the kind of big, dirty guitar riffs that made Pacific Northwestern bands the kings of the alt-rock heap once upon a time. The world-weary, wise-guy angularity of Car Seat Headrest can bring to mind the lurching, loose-limbed attack of Railroad Jerk. And laconic, storytelling types like Nap Eyes stand to prove that there’s still a bright future ahead for those who mourn the passing of Silver Jews main man David Berman. But perhaps the best thing about a face-off between the modern indie bands evoking ’90s forebears and the old-school artists themselves is the fact that in this kind of competition, everybody wins.

Photograph: Misha Vladimirskiy/FilterlessJack White didn’t invent garage-blues, yet more than any other modern rocker the ornery dude has helped transform it from an underground phenomenon into a mainstream one. (And yes, The Black Keys certainly deserve major props, too.) There are now a wealth of high-profile musicians soaking bluesy, beastly jams in demonic layers of fuzz and echo-soaked string-bending. In addition to guitar-hero-in-the-making Gary Clark Jr. and, of course, the mighty Alabama Shakes, there’s the British outfit Royal Blood, as well as Deap Vally, a female two-piece from L.A. that turn all their angst into jackhammering, hip-swaggering, fist-pumping awesomeness. Our playlist also spotlights cuts from those artists in the 1980s and ’90s who were pioneers in the folding of rowdy garage-punk into the earthy mysteriousness that reaches all the way back to the Mississippi Delta. The blues, after all, are about tradition.

Whats This Playlist All About? The LCD Soundsystem mastermind and pals David & Stephen Dewaele of Soulwax and 2ManyDJs got back to spinning vinyl (and only vinyl) at their 2018 Despacio party residency at Queens Knockdown Center. If you were there, you may have enjoyed the set while sipping on wines from Murphys restaurant, Four Horsemen. If you werent, Brooklyn Vegans Arielle Gordon graciously compiled this mix featuring highlights from the first of three nights.What Do You Get? A whole lot of classic disco, New Wave, and house, all on the headier end of the dance spectrum. It kicks off with one of Paul McCartneys weirdest (and best) synth experiments ("Check My Machine"), then digs into classic Bowie, Byrne, and Carly Simon, alongside a few Soulwax remixes of French artistes Charlotte Gainsbourg and The Peppers. In between, theres just enough dance-floor cheese sprinkled about (including some "Jungle Boogie") to keep the mood pleasantly lighthearted.Greatest Discovery: The 1983 collaboration between French composer Hector Zazou, Congolese singer Bony Bikaye, and electronic duo CY1, who mixed analog synths, krautrock, funk, and African influences into entrancing tracks like "Lamuka."Guiltiest Pleasure: Lyn Christophers slinky, sexy funk-pop sizzler "Take Me With You."Best Surprise: Black Sabbaths psychedlic slow-burner "Planet Caravan." It glues together the surrounding disco beats and funky grooves surprisingly well.Toss Up: James Murphy Spinning This Mix or an All LCD Soundsystem Set? Were going to go with the former here, if only because were getting a little older and hearing these classics alongside a couple glasses of that wine sounds pretty nice right about now.

Vancouver power duo Japandroids kicked off 2017 with a big bang by releasing their biggest and boldest album yet, Near to the Wild Heart of Life, back in January. And if you caught the band on their subsequent never-ending world tour this year, then these songs may sound familiar… “For me, 2017 was a wild ride. I spent almost the entire year on tour—100 shows in 20 countries—so I was always on the move. There were highs, lows, and everything in-between, which is very typical of touring. If there was any one constant among all the craziness, it might be my pre-show playlist, which I listen to every night before we go on stage—you know, to get pumped up. I initially made this playlist in January, ahead of our first shows, and had every intention of keeping it the same throughout the year… but every so often, 2017 sent a undeniable jam my way, and thus some swapping inevitably occurred. And so while not all of these songs are from 2017, when I think back on the year in music, or at least my year in music, this is what I hear.”—Brian King of Japandroids

Long Island indie-rock hero Jeff Rosenstock kicked off 2018 in the most awesome way possible: With a surprise album, POST-, released on January 1 to Bandcamp through his own Quote Unquote label. (Polyvinyl Records followed the next day with a widespread digital release before issuing it on vinyl in March.) The new record sees Rosenstock pushing his patented shout-along underdog-punk anthems to thrilling new levels of emotional intensity and instrumental extravagance. (Seriously, "USA" should be Americas new national anthem.) And after dropping the first great album of 2018, he gives us the first great playlist!

"Hey you over there! Its Jeff Rosenstock over here! I didnt go super high-concept with my playlist like 10 Songs To Break Up With Your Lover Over Lunch To or make, like, a playlist with songs from animated movies that would be great to listen to on a long drive and call it Car Tunes. I tried to just make a playlist like I would have made a mix tape or CD when I was a kid——just as many songs I like that could fit onto a CD-R."—Jeff Rosenstock

1. PARQUET COURTS, "SUNBATHING ANIMAL": Parquet Courts are one of my favorite bands, and this song is SO FUCKIN SICK! Just listen to it!

2. CYNDI LAUPER, "MONEY CHANGES EVERYTHING": Not that long ago, I found out that Cyndi Laupers Shes So Unusual was a record stacked with great pop jams. It plays like a greatest hits record, not a debut album.

3. BLACK SABBATH, "SYMPTOM OF THE UNIVERSE (REMASTERED VERSION)": Wow! Remastered for my listening pleasure! Thanks, someone! I like playing this riff at soundcheck cause its so thiiiiick and I can think of Beavis and Butthead singing it. Also the shift in the middle of this song is a good example of later-Ozzy-era Black Sabbath taking weird risks! The four records they did after Paranoid are epic and amazing, check em out.

4. ALVVAYS, "THE AGENCY GROUP": You know that guy at the party who is drunk and talking too loud about some band that youve heard of and havent heard and you just want him to go away? Well, that is me any time anyone brings up Alvvays, cause I cannot stop listening to their records. I picked this song because its fun to sing at soundcheck, and a love song titled after a booking agency is good bit.

5. LIL MAMA, "LIP GLOSS": This song is the banger to end all bangers, and I think we can all get behind the universal truth that Lil Mamas lip gloss is poppin.

6. CAKE, "ROCK N ROLL LIFESTYLE": Haaaaaaaa... I heard this song on the radio the other day and thought it was funny. Cake is a cool band, but I dont know much about em.

7. CHAI, "SOUND & STOMACH": Heard this band at a listening station in the Shibuya Tower Records. I really like J-Pop, J-Rock, whatever this is. I kinda thought, "Whoa, I discovered a new hip underground band!" and then I saw ads for their new album lining the streets later on. Im down with any song that has speak-sing rapping a la "There Was a Door" by Crying.

8. LABRADORS, "ALL I HAVE IS MY HEART": We played with the Labradors when we were on tour in Italy and they were so good. I had this song stuck in my head for months after we returned and it always makes me think of good times in Italy.

9. ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA, "ACROSS THE BORDER": Okay, so if you like ELO, but you only know the hits, Im here to give you a HARD 10/10 RECOMMENDATION to check out their albums from Eldorado up until Discovery. They are great! Maybe start with A New World Record or Discovery. Anyway, this songs not on either of those two records.

10. SCARED OF CHAKA, "WHY ARE YOU WEIRD?": I have woken up with this song stuck in my head for the last 15 years.

11. P.O.S, "PUREXED": Ive known Stef for a while and its been really fun to watch him turn into such a great creative rapper. This song is next level and totally caught me off guard the first time I heard it.

12. SONIC YOUTH, "BULL IN THE HEATHER": I just basically always want to listen to this song. Theres also a sick Go! Team cover of this

13. KENDRICK LAMAR, "FEAR.": I really liked this record, every song is a jam, and it was hard to choose. I picked this one because I love the verses which, from what I read somewhere, are from the perspective of him as at ages seven, 17, and 27. Kendrick Lamar makes cool shit, have you heard of him?

14. THE VANDALS, "I HAVE A DATE": I heard this song late at night on the radio when I was like 13 or 14 and scrambled to find a blank tape and record as much of it as possible to listen to over and over. Warren Fitzgerald has been a guitar hero of mine forever. He doesnt do any wild n crazy shit on this one, but he does sing on it and its a lot of fun.

15. SCATMAN JOHN, "SCATMANS WORLD": Oh man, have you heard this song? Have you seen this video? Have you looked into the history of Scatman John, who started scatting to embrace a stutter that he was always self-conscious about? BA BO BAYY BO BOPPITY.

16. THE THERMALS, "HEY YOU": Im guessing you like The Thermals, but maybe you forgot that they put out a great record in 2016 that had this perfect pop-punk song on it.

17. FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE, "SURVIVAL CAR": I never really liked the song "Stacys Mom" and assumed this band would be annoying until my wife played me this perfect power-pop record. It was hard to pick a song on it, but this song is just such a feel-good classic. Roll the windows down! Do the thingy with your hand and the wind! Oh no, roll the window back up, its freezing!

18. KIM MITCHELL, "GO FOR A SODA": This past summer, we had the pleasure of having Zack Mykula of PUP play drums for us in Canada, and his partner Julia rode with us for a few days as well. We made a playlist of Canadian songs we knew and they were like, "yo, you dont know shit about Canada" and we were like "fair enough." They introduced us to a LOT of pub-rock anthems, but this one just takes the cake. "Might as well go for a soda/ Nobody hurts/ And nobody cries" over arena-rock drums? Its so fun to me finding out about a big hit song in another country that just never made it over to me. Anyway, thats what I have to say about Kim Mitchell. Also, if you wanna listen to more, I suggest checking out "I Am A Wild Party"——theres only a live version and its an insane song.

19. SHIT PRESENT, "SHIT TALK": I love Ionas songs and I love Shit Present. I saw her play this on her own the last time we were in the UK and it made me very happy. Its no "My Fruit Bowl" but I cant find that one on Spotify.

20. SQUEEZE, "ANOTHER NAIL IN MY HEART": Squeeze is another band, like ELO, that I think people have heard are good, but might only know "Tempted" and been like, "Yeah, I guess theyre okay." Well, guess what: Squeeze rocks! Fast, wordy power-pop. I listen to Squeeze all the damn time. Also, "Tempted" is sick too, back off!

21. THE SIDEKICKS, "DAISY": If listening to The Sidekicks is not part of your life, NOW IS THE TIME TO GET IN. This record is a great place to start, and then youll get stoked cause their next record is going to be amazing, and then youre gonna go back to Runners and Weight of Air and be like, "Wow, these are great too, how is this band so good?" And then youll be like me every time I see The Sidekicks. BE LIKE ME only this one time.

In August 2017, indie rocker Jen Cloher released her self-titled record, which cracked the Top 5 on the album charts in her native Australia; she also received a great deal of exposure in North America when her song “Fear Is Like a Forest” was covered on Lotta Sea Lice, the collaborative album from Kurt Vile and Cloher’s better half, Courtney Barnett. Before she heads out on her U.S. and European tours in early 2018, Jen shares the songs that defined 2017 for her. “2017 was a year where we heard more diverse voices break through, in Australia particularly. While global politics became more regressive, divisive, and fear-mongering, music did the opposite.”—Jen Cloher

Avant-folk-rock explorers Xylouris White——a.k.a. Greek singer/lute player George Xylouris and drummer Jim White of Australian trio The Dirty Three—released their third album, Mother, on Bella Union. Here, White gives us a peek into his eclectic music collection with a set that spans psychedelic jazz to post-punk to modern pop.Xylouris White are currently touring across the U.S. before hitting Europe in the spring; check here for upcoming dates.

A tip of the hat goes to Open Culture for turning up this sprawling, 16-hour collection of John Peel Sessions. From 1967 until his death in 2004, the iconic BBC radio DJ invited an enormous array of bands to record special sessions in the studio, from original punks like Killing Joke and Siouxsie and the Banshees to prog rockers like Jethro Tull, and on up to electronic musicians like Mira Calix and The Orb. Scanning the list of artists boggles the mind: Buzzcocks, The Smiths, Nick Drake, Nirvana, David Bowie—many different scenes, generations, and levels of fame, with the only common denominator being that theyre all acts that mattered, even if only for a few devout listeners as passionate as Peel himself. Currently 255 songs long, this playlist doesnt contain all the Peel Sessions, by any stretch of the imagination, but presumably itll be updated as more titles come online. And while the range of artists represented doesnt necessarily lend itself to a stylistically coherent listen, that hardly matters: Peels entire M.O., after all, was introducing listeners to brilliant music, no matter the style.

After collaborating with the likes of Nico Muhly and Ben Frost, and serving as a sound tech for the Philip Glass Ensemble, Canadian soundscape artist Jonathan Kawchuk will give his debut album, North, a wide release on January 26 through Paper Bag Records. But while the record presents a meditative melange of drifting piano melodies, string-scraping drones, and field-recording ambiance, the music that inspires him is decidedly less chill... “I have a Spotify folder that holds all these time-capsule playlists. Whenever my life enters a new feel or vibe, I make a playlist of whatever new music I’m listening to at the time. I have a playlist called ‘i’m learning’ for a stretch of my life when I was sneaking into university classes. I have a playlist called ‘ooo nåni nåni,’ which is when I moved to Toronto. There’s ‘Damn He Woke Me Up Early,’ ‘i miss mutek,’ ‘17 crux,’ ‘This way out!,’ et al. I do this when I’m writing as well; listening and picking apart a ton of music helps me hunt for the language I’m trying to speak. And even though my new record North is coming out soon, I thought it would be fun to share the playlist of what’s informing my music right now.”—Jonathan Kawchuk