MIND DE-CODER 26

To listen to the show just scroll to the bottom of the page

MIND DE-CODER 26

"Just relax...keep it cool..and let your head go where it really wants to."

KIM FOWLEY     THE TRIP

What a great way to start the show. What a great way to start a record: “Summertime’s here, kiddies…and it’s time to take a trip”. Released as a single in 1965, in a mere two minutes Fowley walks the line between throwaway novelty trash and pure psychotic stream-of-consciousness genius taking in and taking on Surfin’ Bird, Louie Louie, Wooly Bully and 96 Tears along the way. Marvellous.

Welcome to Mind De-Coder26 

FORTYONE      BUCKETS

Crazy-super-magical-funtime-goodness from cut-and-paste genius Fortyone. This track is taken from the CD NO MORE MAYONNAISE, which is available for free, along with 29 other CDs, simply by writing to him here. It's a bit like listening to cartoons on the radio - too much and your teeth begin to ache, but there is a whole world of Fortyone out there for you, if you but only choose.

TOMORROW      MY WHITE BICYCLE

This is one of two singles released by one of the key psychedelic pop bands of the UK underground in the 1960s, inspired by the Dutch Provos, an anarchist movement based in Amsterdam which reportedly instituted a community bicycle programme. Recorded at the EMI studios in London and produced by the legendary Joe Boyd, this is the kind of kaleidoscopic pop that was blaring out of the nation's transistors in 1967.

FAUST      FLASHBACK CARUSO

Taken from the legendary FAUST TAPES, released in 1973, an album I return to time and time again for all my trip needs. Released for 49p by a nascent Virgin Records, the story goes that Jim Kerr of Simple Minds threw his copy off the roof of a Glasgow tenement, which pretty much tells you everything you need to know about the Simple Minds, I think.

MOON WIRING CLUB     TIFFIN TIME

If I tell you this track can be found on Ian Hodgson’s second album SHOES OFF AND CHAIRS AWAY, released in 2008, then the title alone should tell you what to expect. Working tirelessly with his copy of Music for the Playstation 2 (seriously, what’s more hauntological than that?) Hodgson has again used the history of forgotten British television to source his banks of samples, and the results really speak for themselves. Most artists simply wouldn’t have the patience to do what Hodgson does, and the sheer attention to detail is astounding. Hauntolgical cleverness at its best.

BONGWATER      MR SOUL

A brilliant cover version of Buffalo Springfield's Mr Soul by Bongwater, not so much a band as a particularly disturbing bad dream, taken from the Neil Young tribute album THE BRIDGE, released in 1989.

NEU!      SPITZENQUALITAT

A dominant motorik beat taken from Neu!'s second album NEU! 2, released in 1973. This is the album on which they famously run out of money and had to make Side 2 by speeding up and slowing down bits of Side 1. Spitzenqualitat is from Side 1 - it's supposed to sound like this.

MELLOW      CORRIDOR

A track taken from the soundtrack to the film CQ, a retro-futuristic romp about something or other that never actually saw the light of day. But the soundtrack is fabulous - a mix of campy, sci-fi, retro spy-chase, swinging 60's mod grooves with a touch of pastoral folk and woozy psychedelia thrown in for good measure, released in 2002. The band Mellow are French and from the same stable as fellow Parisians, Air. I think they may have been in the same proto-band at some point or other, before splitting off to follow their more prog-y groove.

JULIAN COPE      SAFESURFER

The mighty Julian Cope in full-on psychedelic mode with the epic Safesurfer, taken from the extraordinary PEGGY SUICIDE, released in 1991. This particular track can take you so far out you'd be wise to leave a trail of breadcrumbs behind you in order to get back home again - if you ever wish to return, that is.

PAUL WELLER      KOSMOS (LYNCH MOB BONUS BEATS REMIX)

Taken from Wellers HUNG UP EP, released in 1994, this is a big, spacey, dubbed out bit of psychedelic bliss that can, at points, take the enamel off your teeth. That's two references to the teeth in this blog. It must be a metaphor, or something.

TANGERINE DREAM      FLY AND COLLISION OF COMAS SOLA

A 13 minute drum and flute freak-out epic that sounds like there's a planet passing through your living room while you're next door making a cup of tea. As Julian Cope says in Krautrocksampler - it's as if the musicians feel each others vibrations but can't actually hear the music they're making. Brilliant, expansive, and to be found on their 1971 album ALPHA CENTAURI.

JOHN OSWALD     TRANSILENCE/POURING VELVET/

 IN REVOLVING ASH LIGHT/FOLDBACK TIME

John Oswald is the composer and sound-collage artist whose best known work is the Plunderphonics project, released in 1988, which took audio piracy as a compositional prerogative and later became the staple practice of hip-hop and indeed mash-ups. In 1993 Oswald was approached by Phil Lesh, of The Grateful Dead, to record a short version of the band’s classic Dark Star as a possible single release. What Oswald actually did was plunder the vaults and using over a hundred different live copies of the song recorded between 1965 and 1993  built, layered and folded all of them to produce one large, recomposed version spanning just sixteen minutes short of two hours. The finished project was the homophonically entitled GREYFOLDED released in 1995 and is, in essence, the only Grateful Dead or Grateful Dead-related record that features participation by every person who was ever in the group between 1965 and 1995. Obviously it divided opinion between fans of the Dead, but never having any opinions about the band myself, I think it’s great (or should that be ‘grate’?*), so I’ve included several sections of the recording to give you an idea of how the whole thing pans out. 

(*No, no it shouldn’t)

THE VIRGINEERS     FLOATING

The Virgineers, whose pastiche of the 60’s psychedelic sound is a spot-on homage to the music they so obviously love. Floating is taken from their only album, THE VIRGINEERS, released in 1999. Not much is known about the band itself, but the duo claim to have formed when they met at an art school for wayward girls in their hometown of Sydville, an Antarctic seaport built on the baby octopus trade. Another story suggests, more prosaically, that they’re from Chicago. Despite this, many of the songs reveal the more whimsical English tea-garden variety of psychedelia, but Floating sounds like The Monkees in their Head days. Whoever they are, they need to do more.

SMALL FACES     GREEN CIRCLES

This is the slightly heavier American version of the track that appeared on their album THERE ARE BUT FOUR SMALL FACES, a U.S. version of their second English LP SMALL FACES, released 1967. The band claims that with tracks like this they were merely trying to explain the images conjured up while they enjoyed themselves tripping. It works for me.

BRAINTICKET     PART ONE: CONCLUSION

Absolutely marvelous track from little known Krautrock group Brainticket, formed by the splendidly named Joel Vandroogenbroeck, whose debut album COTTONWOODHILL , released in 1971, came with the warning: “Only listen to this once a day. Your brain might be destroyed”, which immediately got in banned in America. It also adds: “After listening to this record, your friends might not know you anymore”. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

WOLF PEOPLE     INTERLUDE: COTTON FRAGMENT

TIDINGS, released 2010, the first fractured and frenzied release from Wolf people, is very much a schizophrenic affair, taking in updated versions of classic blues structures alongside half-remembered English folk songs employing the full use of hissing guitars, distorted blues harmonica, acid rock, mystical flutes and crackling tape. Many of the songs are only half finished, snippets of ideas picked over and discarded, some coming in under 30 seconds or so. It’s a diverse album, full of ideas and avenues to explore at a later date (some of which they got back to on their second album, Steeple). Featuring as many ‘real songs’ as ‘interludes’, its use of avant-garde studio trickery and tape distortion the album puts me in mind of The Faust Tapes, although I seem to be the one person to have noticed that.

STRAWBERRY ALARM CLOCK      RAINY DAY MUSHROOM PILLOW

West coast vibes from San Francisco's 1967 hippy scene. The song title says it all, really. Taken from the album INCENSE AND PEPPERMINTS which, once again, pretty much sums it up. Elegant, dreamy and baroque.

BRUCE AND MISS NELSON      SOUL TRANSPORTATION

One of the weirdest records in my record collection, which is saying something, this comes from the album DANCE TO THE MUSIC, one of a series of LPs released in the 1970's (this one was released in 1972) recorded for children by composer Bruce Haack and dance instructor Esther Nelson. It scares the life out of my kids so I don't play it as much as I might.

BEYOND THE WIZARD'S SLEEVE      THE FIFTH NOTE

In which Erol Alkan remixes Chitra Neogy’s The Blue Sari from her semi-legendary album THE PERFUMED GARDEN on Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve second release, the vinyl only SPRING, released in 2006. 

BROADCAST     SUCH TENDER THINGS/TERESA – LARK OF ASCENSION/

SERPENT’S SEMEN

Following the unexpected and much lamented death of Broadcast's Trish Keenan in 2011 I sadly thought that that was the last we’d hear from them, so I was delighted to discover that just before her death they’d been working on the soundtrack to an Italian horror movie set in the 1970’s which, as you can imagine, was right up their street. It features Omen-like church organs, classic horror FX, a spot of occult flute playing, and Goblin-type whispers, reminiscent of their work on Dario Argento’s Suspiria soundtrack wherein the period-precise score captures the claustrophobic dread and paranoia of the film, called BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO. I’ve included three pieces from the soundtrack, two that show off Keenan’s wonderful icy-sharp voice for the last time, and the last, called Serpent’s Semen because, well, who wouldn’t want to hear a track called Serpent’s Semen? (It last’s 6 seconds and consists of a bone-chilling scream, you'll know it when you hear it).

COMUS      THE HERALD

It wasn't all peace, love and pass the sugarcubes in the early 1970's acid/folk scene. Comus, who could have been written to feature in a Merrily Watkins mystery, seem drawn to the dark side. Their album FIRST UTTERANCE, released in 1971, evokes many feelings, but most dominant are fear, confusion and despair - check out the cover, drawn by band leader Roger Wootton, no plate-eyed hippy chicks here - the lyrics often invoke images of violence, murder, rape and mental disorder; so not an album to listen to late at night with a few joss sticks glowing and a handful of magic mushrooms, then. It's not a date album, either. It does have one moment of transcendent beauty, however, the tranquil yearning of The Herald on which I finish the show.

I thank you.

MIND DE-CODER 25

To listen to the show scroll to the bottom of the page

MIND DE-CODER 33

 “You are the banana on the floor”

SPACEMEN 3      COME DOWN SOFTLY TO MY SOUL

This mesmerising track offers a gentle introduction to tonight's show. This is taken from the band’s third album, PLAYING WITH FIRE, released in 1988, an album that got me through my bed-sit days (along with The Smiths, obviously). By turns gentle, numbed-out and kind, the album also offers up some fairly comprehensive wig-outs too, just the sort of thing to help me through those times when it all seemed a bit too much for a boy to take.

THE ROLLING STONES      SHE'S A RAINBOW

I first heard this song under rather enhanced circumstances wandering around Chislehurst caves in Kent (UK) at a Magical Mystery Trip 'happening' put together by a psychedelic club I used to go to in the early 80's called Alice In Wonderland. The plinky-plonky harpsichord/piano bit in the middle picked me up and took me somewhere very colourful and far away. It occurred to me the other day that I've spent a lot of the intervening time since then trying to get back there. She's A Rainbow, of course, is taken from THEIR SATANIC MAJESTIES REQUEST, released in 1967 as a response to The Beatles' Sgt. Peppers album, and all recent re-evaluations aside, it's still a largely divisive album with a handful of tracks within its grooves which are as good as anything the Stones have ever produced (and on all those drugs too - I can barely put the kettke on safely under similar circumstances), but it does also contain some wilfully affected nonsense. I think She's A Rainbow is quite super.

TIMOTHY LEARY      THE TURN ON/THE TUNE IN

Two tracks taken from one of the trippiest albums I own, and that's saying something. On TURN ON, TUNE IN, DROP OUT, released in 1967, acid guru Leary offers a guided meditation through a trip over some pretty far-out psychedelic rock that, at some points, takes you so far into your head, the idea of ever coming back somehow escapes you. I have absolutely lost myself in this album. Originally recorded to accompany a documentary of the same name in which Leary guides fellow researcher, writer and psychologist Ralph Metzner through a trip, it’s an essential psychedelic experience, but kind of scary too, especially if your name actually is Ralph.

THE BEATLES     FLYING

Originally entitled Arial Tour Instrumental, Flying was recorded as a segment for THE MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR in 1967 and is pleasant little filler with some Indian influenced vibes and some beautiful varispeed Mellotron by Lennon, with added vocals lifted directly from the film.

VERVE      WHERE THE GEESE GO

A lovely song, released in the days before Verve records got to hear about them and forced a definitive article upon them, taken from their little known album NO COME DOWN, a collection of B-sides and acoustic versions of their songs which was released in 1994 and was probably only available in Japan, or something.

LEVITATION      SMILE

Prog-rock bliss, brought to you by dedicated acid-head Terry Bickers, Levitation's debut release THE COPPELIA EP, from 1990, was a statement of intent that the band were never quite able to live up to. Smile remains as the best example of what they were capable of and is, in all senses of the word, an epic. A plaintive vocal over a gently strummed guitar heralds a beautiful, mid paced, proggy riff that is itself shadowed by crystalline chimes of guitar. The sound builds with vocal and guitar harmonies and gorgeous themes and reprises of the main melodies. Then moments of quiet, interspersed with gentle guitar echoes, until the flailatron drums bring the whole thing to a lush, pompous and grandiose climax....then again, drifting back to quiet...peace, childlike keys and Levitation have left your head. Love it still!

Possibly describes an acid trip. I played this record all the time when it came out.

TIM BUCKLEY      HALLUCINATIONS

Taken from his live album, 1968's DREAM LETTER, this song is elegant, otherworldly and gorgeous. When I first heard this track on a tape cassette a friend had made me, I had no idea it was a live performance. I was so entranced that when the spellbound audience erupted into applause at the end of the track I leapt out of my seat in surprise, wondering how six hundred people could possibly have sneaked into my room behind me while my mind was elsewhere.

FUTURO     BREATH WITH ME TILL DAWN

The only mash-up on tonight's show, but what a sublimely beautiful piece of music it is. Judie Tzuke's 1979 hit Stay With Me Till Dawn mashed into Pink Floyd's Breathe, this song is full of late night yearning and as sexy as hell. Created in 2009 by Steve Lima, you can find it on Futuro's website here.

CORNELIUS      SENSUOUS

Taken from the third full length album by Cornelius, this is the title track from 2007's SENSUOUS, an ambient little guitar melody that never goes anywhere much but which holds you in a gentle trance before we come to...

PENTANGLE      LIGHT FLIGHT

Possibly my favourite track on tonight's show and my favourite song by Pentangle, the sublime Light Flight, taken from my favourite album by the band, 1969's BASKET OF LIGHT. This is possibly the most hummable song I know, vocalist Jacqui McShee's spine-tingling voice soars over Bert Jansch's and John Renbourne's jazzy guitar playing to create a song that just wraps you up in it's own sense of wonder. Apparently this song was a huge hit in New Zealand so you might even find it in your parent's record collection. One for the flower children.

THE MONKEES      SWAMI WITH STRINGS

Taken from the soundtrack to the film HEAD, in which the Monkees deconstruct their teen-pop image in a lysergic mobius-strip of a movie that ultimately means nothing, but in doing so kind of means everything. The album itself, released in 1968, only has six songs, the rest of it is made up of sound collages taken from the movie and edited together by Jack Nicholson of all people. It's one of the trippiest albums I own ( I know I've said that before, but I really do mean it every time I say so) and one of the trippiest films I have in my DVD collection, too. Bizarrely, nobody I know shows the remotest interest in either of them. Weird.

PRIMAL SCREAM     CRYSTAL CRESCENT

This early version of Primal Scream often used to receive quite the critical kicking from the music press – I remember their first album was compared to Sooty and Sweep playing at being Love – but this single, release in 1986, is a joyful explosion of pop energy and thrills that never fails to put a smile on my face whenever I hear it.

13th FLOOR ELEVATORS     ROLLER COASTER

The most notable thing about the legendary 13th Floor Elevators, of course, isn’t whether they were the first band to use the term ‘psychedelic’ to describe their music (I understand The Blue Magoos and The Holy Modal Rounders have an opinion about that) but their psychedelic use of the electric jug to define their sound; I never got the hang of it. Roller Coaster is taken from their debut album, THE PSYCHEDELIC SOUND OF THE 13TH FLOOR ELEVATORS, released in 1966, featuring sleeve notes by lyricist and electric jug player Tommy Hall, in which he argues chemical agents, such as your LSD, create a gateway to higher, 'non-Aristotelian' states of consciousness'. I can’t argue with that, I’ve just never considered the electric jug as contributing to that effect – not that I want to go on about it too much.  At Hall’s urging the band played most of their live shows and recorded their albums while under the influence of LSD, and built their lifestyle and music around the psychedelic experience. Intellectual and esoteric influences also helped shape their work, which shows traces of Gurdjieff, the General Semantics of Alfred Korzybski, the psychedelic philosophy of Timothy Leary, and Tantric meditation. The album, their two subsequent releases, and the band’s philosophy, went on to inform the likes of Julian Cope, Spacemen 3 and Primal Scream – I can’t say enough good things about them.

IVOR CUTLER     A RED FLOWER

A surreal recitation told in Cutler’s trademark dolorous tone, taken from his debut album proper WHO TORE YOUR TROUSERS?, released in 1961. The weirdest thing, though, is the photo on the front cover, a positively youthful looking Ivor aged 28, as opposed to the wizened version that I’ve grown used to over the years.  

MOON WIRING CLUB     CREEP IN OUR EARS

More inspired hauntological going’s on from The Moon Wiring Club – this eerie little track taken from the 2009 release STRIPED PAINT FOR THE LAST POST.

BILL HOLT     PROGRAM 11

DREAMIES, by Bill Holt, is one of the great lost albums of the 1970’s. Legend has it that, inspired by The Beatles’ Revolution 9, Holt, in his late 20’s, quit his comfortable but uninspiring job, holed himself up with a Moog Sonic 6 and guitar and set out to realize his dream of becoming a musician. The result was his 1973 album Dreamies, a groundbreaking album created from news sound bites and found sound, radio and television broadcasts, as well as samples taken from recordings by The Beatles, arranged in an expansive collage, layered with his strumming acoustic guitar and experimental electronic sounds that consisted of just two long tracks, called Program 10 and Program 11, stretched out over either side of the record. Despite being one of the earliest examples of sampling in popular music, it was very much an album of its times,  reflecting the tumultuous times of the 60’s in America, the Vietnam War, the youth culture revolution and other current events. Beyond The Wizards Sleeve, who always have an eye for the obscure, edited a section from Program 10 for their track Sunday Morning Sun-g which appears on their George album, which I played on last week’s show. I play 15 minutes or so from Program 11 for your listening pleasure, a tripped out mix that throbs with the pleasure of its own existence. As is often the case with your visionaries, the album failed to find an audience and Holt returned to his day job, although I read recently that, inspired by events in a post 9/11 America, he’s returned to the studio and recorded a further Program 13 and, indeed, Program 14. 

THE MOON WIRING CLUB     RAFFLING STREET

Ornate, dreamlike glamour from LEPORINE PLEASURE GARDENS, released 2015.

MOONSHAKE     COMING

I remember this track used to have me dancing around my bedsit at two in the morning, absolutely swept away by its spikey rhythms, shimmering loops and yearning atmosphere. The band grew out of the ashes of C86 group The Wolfhounds, who, like many of those acts, found that particular definition to be something of a creative cul-de-sac. For their debut EP, FIRST, released in 1991, Moonshake incorporated a mix of electronica, dub, krautrock and sonic experimentation into their sound that displayed more creativity than most groups are able to muster over a lifetime. Sadly, no one was listening and they remain little more than a footnote to the early 90s shoegazer scene.

BLUR     SHE’S SO HIGH

Unlike Blur, say. I must have seen them four or five times – in their early psychedelic phase, their gor blimey, missus Modern Life Is Rubbish phase, and their post-Pavement all grown up phase (I seem to have missed out on the Britpop phase), but, as a live affair, I absolutely loved their psychedelic phase. I think I actually swooned first time I heard this, released as their debut single in 1990.

STERLING ROSWELL     INTERPLANETARY SPACELINER

I don’t think anyone expected the former drummer of Spacemen 3 to suddenly up and decide to release an album, but that’s exactly what Sterling Roswell did in 2014, calling it THE CALL OF THE COSMOS. It is, by turns, either a beautifully languid poppy affair, or a full on experimental sonic assault – it works best, however, when it manages to do both at the same time. Interplanetary Spaceliner is the other worldly opening track.

SOFT HEARTED SCIENTISTS     CARNIVAL SONG

 An agreeably dreamy track from THE SLOW CYCLONE, released in 2014 and a  double album comprising ‘proper’ pop songs, weird interludes, science fiction love songs, mantras, cosmic country songs, 12 string guitar instrumentals, heartbroken robot songs, and ‘Leonard Cohen in 1968’ songs of mortality. I love it, as you can imagine.

THE MARTHAS AND ARTHURS     BARBEROSOPHY

A Capella oddness from the Martha And Arthurs, whose debut album THE HIT WORLD OF…MARTHAS AND ARTHURS, released in 2012, otherwise owes more to the Mamas and the Papas, all pastoral pop folk and gorgeous layered harmonies.

BEAULIEU PORCH     IS

Proper psychedelic goodness from Simon Berry, who releases under the name of Beaulieu Porch. This track is taken from a compilation of his first two albums, released by the Active Listener in 2014, each track a psych-pop miniature featuring sky-wide arrangements full of baroque orchestration and Walrus-like chants and choruses that inhabit a world of pastoral loveliness.

THE BEATLES     JULIA (OUT-TAKE)

The ghostly sound of John Lennon in an early take of THE WHITE ALBUM's Julia. Simple, affecting and, when his spoken voice comes in at the end, quite electrifying. You can find this on ANTHOLOGY 3, released in 1996.

And that was Mind De-Coder 25. I thank you.

MIND DE-CODER 24

To listen to the show just scroll to the bottom of the page

MIND DE-CODER 24

“Be glad for the song has no ending…”

TAME IMPALA     BE ABOVE IT

The opening track from Tame Impala’s second album, LONERISM, (2012), and you can almost taste the acid dissolving on your tongue. 

SMOKE      MY FRIEND JACK

An alternate mix of their 1967 cult hit, that can be found on the 2006 CD re-issue of their only album, IT’S SMOKE TIME. This song, even in its sanitized radio-friendly form, spelled commercial suicide for the band, getting them banned by the BBC for its ’suggestive’ lyrics, but it remains a definitive slice of acid inspired psych-pop that, with the Tame Impala track before it, sets the tone for the rest of tonight's show.

SYD BARRETT      IT'S NO GOOD TRYING

What can you say about Syd Barrett that hasn't been said? I like this particular track because it owes more to the playful Syd revealed on THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN, than the fragile acid casualty he'd become by the time he recorded THE MADCAP LAUGHS in 1970. That being said, this is still an acid soaked trip through the man's brittle psyche, the giddy, woozy production can be quite disorientating - exactly the way I like my tunes, in fact.

THE DUKES OF STRATOSPHEAR     WHAT IN THE WORLD??...

This is XTC satisfying their Beatles/Pink Floyd trip, taken from the brilliantly psychedelic album 25 O’CLOCK, a six track mini-album released in 1985. This is one of my favourite albums of all time, containing every psychedelic reference point available, but put together with such heartfelt joy and enthusiasm, that the listener is simply swept along by their love of mellotrons, phasing, backwards guitars, echoey piano, primitive feedback, keening harmonies and stereo panning, but most of all - good tunes! I never tire of listening to this album. It's a rip-off, but a brilliant one, produced by the great John Leckie, who was obviously enjoying himself as much as the band. This album has just enjoyed a lavishly packaged re-issue which you may want to get your hands on.

FAUST     J'AI MAL AUX DENTS

The first of four tracks taken from the legendary THE FAUST TAPES, released in 1973 for just 49 pence by the nascent Virgin records. The next three tracks are Untitled, Untitled and Dr. Scwitters, but that is largely beside the point, as the album is mostly made up of sound collages and cut and paste edits that weren't meant to be named. In fact, the original album had no track listing, and it wasn't until the Faust box-set was released a few years ago, that I discovered Faust weren't singing "Chet-va Buddah" but J'ai Mal Aux Dents, which I think is French for My Teeth Hurt. This is one of my favourite trip albums of all time, an album that opened me up to a world of possibilities - the first time I heard it, it scared the life out of me and blew me away at the same time. Hidden among the experimental tracks are a handful of truly wonderful pop and rock songs that will take you to other far away places - the perfect Mind De-coder album.

THE BYRDS      CHANGE IS NOW

Hidden away as an extra track on the Columbia CD re-issue of The Byrd's ground-breaking 1968 album, THE NOTORIOUS BYRD BROTHERS, sits the enticingly titled Universal Mind Decoder, a three and half minute Roger McGuinn guitar wig-out that eventually became Change Is Now. The first time I heard Change Is Now, under heightened circumstances, it must be said, I realised that I'd just found my favourite pop song ever, and that the album itself is the perfect pop-art record, recorded by a band that were barely talking to each other at the time. I love Change Is Now so much - what with that initial guitar wig-out now pared down to 45 seconds, the optimism of the lyrics' and that crazy slide guitar that comes out of nowhere - that when I was searching around for a title for this show the demo version sprung to mind, and thus Mind De-Coder was born. The Byrds were never the same after this album, and nor was I. 

When asked whether the horse was meant to represent the David Crosby, who had been fired from the band during the recording of the album, Roger McGuinn is reported to have replied that, if that had indeed been the case, they would have shown the horses arse.

CORNELIUS     CHAPTER 8 - SEASHORE AND HORIZON

Blissful psychedelic pop from Japan's Keigo Oyamada, featuring  Hilarie and Robert Schneider from Apples in Stereo on vocals, who together produce a seamless blend of Pet Sound vibes and magical mystery-pop burnout. And that's just this particular track - the rest of the album, FANTASMA, released back in 1998, is insane.

ESPERS     DEAD QUEEN

This is one of the most exquisitely beautiful songs I've ever heard. Words fail me whenever I hear it so I'll just say that it sounds like a medieval castle revealing itself through the early morning mist, and can found on the album ESPERS 2, released in 2006. This was, in fact, the band's third album, and continues their love of spooky, acoustic folk peppered with flute, cello and even weirder sounds held together with vocalist Meg Baird's voice, which is baroque and amazing. I love this song - it always leaves me feeling spellbound for absolute moments whenever I hear it.

FLYING WHITE DOTS      2000 LIGHT YEARS FROM THE SKY

In which the mash-up artist otherwise known as Bryan from Brighton, England, takes The Rolling Stones' 2000 Light Years From Home and sends it even further off into space. This can be found on the free-to-download album STARING AT THE SKY which you can get your hands on from his web site here. 

SPACE MACHINE     GARDEN OF SOMNOLENCE

Space Machine is the analogue electronic cosmic sound project put together by producer and Acid Mothers temple founder Kawabata Makato. This track can be found on the Acid Mothers Temple Family triple-disc CD DO WHATEVER YOU WANT TO DO, DON’T DO WHATEVER YOU DON’T WANT, released in 2002, a sprawling epic that takes the listener on trip of cosmic proportions, and also segues very nicely into..

POPOL VUH      IN DEN GARTEN PHAROAS

As Julian Cope says in Krautrock sampler, In Den Garten Pharoas is the natural harmony of ancient everyday life - fast drumming in an underground cave, the sculling of oars and a waterfall where woman are crouched at their daily washing, the artificial Star Trek voice of a woman, a priestess, calling the faithful to prayer, the sound of water rushing by a community of endless ancient souls – IN DEN GARTEN PHAROAS, released in 1972, is an album of divine healing music - a wondrous elegiac Adam and Eve trip.

MOON WIRING CLUB     THOUGHTS OF A SUNKEN VILLAGE

Slightly spooky, slightly confounding, slightly short, Thoughts Of A Sunken Village is from the highly prolific Ian Hodgson’s 2009 album, STRIPED PAINT FOR THE LAST POST.

CRANIUM PIE     DRYING IN THE SUN

Cranium Pie make psychedelic prog music with overtones of Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Soft Machine, Caravan and Frank Zappa, a description that doesn’t do them any justice at all. They create the kind of far-out sounds that can only come from the 11th-dimension, although, in their case, I think that means a cave in Wiltshire. Their debut album, MECHANISMS PT. 1, (2011) appears to be a concept album which tells the tale of a civilisation of lobsters rising up against evil robot overlords (or something), while Drying In The Sun comes on like a fluted-up Air playing with a mooged-up The Soft Hearted Scientists. Possibly my new favourite band.

THE VIRGINEERS     HOW FAR DOES SPACE GO?

The elusive and mysterious Virgineers, whose one eponymous album, released in 1999, is a candy-coated 60’s pop flashback in the same way that XTC created The Dukes of Stratosphear to satiate their psychedelic yearnings, or Andrew Goulds’ celebration of the 60’s with The Fraternal Order of the All. It’s a homage to Magical Mystery Tour era Beatles, Head period Monkees and Syd era Pink Floyd, with the odd post-Syd, Atom Heart Mother vibe thrown in for good measure, as evidenced in this track, the spacey How Far Does Space Go?

MILKY     UP ON THE MOON

This spooky little track, Up On The Moon, is brought to you by Milky, a collaboration between ex-husband and wife Maria Napoleon and the semi-legendary Scottish performer Momus, who keeps popping up all over the place. They seemed to have remained good friends - their only album, TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY, released 2002, is full of sparkling little gems like this.

DJ FOOD     COLOURS BEYOND COLOURS

DJ FOOD’s most recent release, THE SEARCH ENGINE, (2012) is actually a compilation of the last three EPs he’s released since 2009 with a few interludes thrown in for good measure. It’s a cheerful mix of sampled old-time radio shows discussing UFOs, outer-space and the nature of sound, combined with hi-pitched sci-fi synthesizers, ominous chords, thumping break-beats and the occasional heavy metal riff. It’s good. I like it.

THE COLORED PLANK     THE BLACK FERRIS WHEEL

The Colored Plank are one of those bands who only seem to exist on compilation albums with names like The Last Daze Of The Underground. In fact, I found it on the compilation A PSYCHEDELIC PSAUNA, released in 1991, and that’s all I’ve ever been able to find out about them. The Black Ferris Wheel is perhaps the weirdest track on tonight’s show which, I hope, really means something.

MATT JOHNSON     THE RIVER FLOWS EAST IN SPRING/

 ANOTHER BOY DROWNING

Two tracks from Matt Johnson’s debut, BURNING BLUE SOUL, released 1981, and an underground classic that got passed around the common room in a reverential fashion as if, in its grooves, lay some holy insight into our existentialist daydreams, hopes and fears. Another Boy Drowning was rarely off the stereo in my bed-sit days when I was experimenting with being a Godless beatnik (oh, yes, the fun never stopped at my place) but The River Flows East In Spring shows just how truly out there Johnson was.  In their own way, both tracks led to Mind De-Coder. However, Another Boy Drowning could only be followed with a little something I put together featuring Allen Ginsberg reading from his poem HOWL! over various backward loops for that psychedelic effect.

BAKING RESEARCH STATION     BLACKSAND

The Baking Research Station are Cranium pie by any other name, but they chose to release this cover of Brainticket’s Blacksand on the very fine Fruits De Mer krautrock influenced spacerock album ROQUETING THROUGH SPACE (released 2010), as The Baking Research Station, their even more deranged side-project, if, indeed, such a thing is possible.

LAVENDER DIAMOND     RISE IN THE SPRINGTIME

From their self-released EP CAVALRY OF LOVE (2006) this is a song of hymn-like hope in the turning to face the dawn of yourself and the gathering up of your pieces found lying scattered around following a beautiful trip of self-exploration and discovery in the sure knowledge that no heart needs remain broken, forgiveness is unconditional, and that all are one beneath the morning sun. Or something. Vocalist Becky Stark's voice is simple and devout, and reassures that all is well and that we are safe, and that in accepting this we give thanks for our place in the universe. It's also nice to hum on the way to work.

To listen to the show click here.