Psychedelic. Like "dream pop," which I'm guilty of overusing myself, psychedelic gets thrown around a lot lately. So much, in fact, that it's becoming kind of hard to know what it means. I mentioned it in my review of Hair by Ty Segall and White Fence, even throwing in "psych-" as a modifier for "rock" and "punk," probably contributing in my own small way to the confusion.
To me, the term psychedelic immediately brings to mind some of the songs on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band -- specifically, "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "A Day in the Life." I think it's all those Lennon "aaah, aaah, aahh"'s. And while I know that there are and have been plenty of American psychedelic acts; because of the Beatles association, I always think of it as being a British sound.
Django Django are a London (by way of Edinburgh) quartet whose self-titled, debut full-length contains many elements of both 1960's psychedelia and the genre's 1980's / 1990's revival (Stone Roses?). The band also add some "math"-y or art-rock elements to achieve a sound that, as I found out upon returning from my lunchtime run with Django Django yesterday, earned them a place on the 2012 Mercury Prize shortlist.
The album opens with three tracks that rely heavily on some 1980's-video-game-sounding electronics and beats. I'm still trying to figure out if the opening sounds on "Introduction" remind me more of Pac-Man or Centipede. "Introduction" bleeds right into "Hail Bop," whose brit-pop sound cuts clearly through the synths and effects. The same can be said of excellent single, "Default."
Not all of the songs, though, rely so heavily on obvious electronic effects. "Firewater," is much more guitar-centric and has a definite 1960's sound. The same can be said of "Love's Dart." Both songs, though, have something a little more programmed and inorganic going on with the rhythms that connects with the overall sound of the album. The most, relatively speaking, conventional-sounding track on the album is probably "Life's a Beach." It's got the jangly guitar you'd expect from the title, but it also contains an almost gothic keyboard break leading into some "aaah"'s.
The all-knowing Wikipedia says that, "a psychedelic experience is characterized... ...by the creative exuberance of the mind liberated from its ostensibly ordinary fetters." I don't know about that, but Django Django do attempt to embellish and liberate conventional British pop and take it in some new directions. Django Django may not be mind-expanding, but it manages to be different from much of today's mainstream indie music while remaining accessible and fun.
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