Tyrannosarus Rex - My People Were Fair and Had Sky in Their Hair... But Now They're Content To Wear Stars on Their Brows (1968)

Before T.Rex became the coked out, glam rock superstars that they are best known as, they were known as Tyrannosaurus Rex and released psychedelic folk albums. My People Were Fair and Had Sky in Their Hair... But Now They're Content To Wear Stars on Their Brows was their first release and sounds like a bunch of hippies in the woods indulging in some mushrooms and playing around a campfire. It almost sounds like the Incredible String Band but with many more great improv freakout moments. This album has great minimalism, with most songs being played solely with acoustic guitar and bongos (man they rock the bongos), sometimes with accompaniment by what sounds like a xylophone. This was a pleasant surprise to find considering how much i abhorre T.Rex's later albums. If only they had continued with their mushroom adventures, but as they say, cocaine is a hell of a drug.

PS. i read somewhere that this is the first English pop record to feature a hare krishna chant (3 years before George Harrison's My Sweet Lord)

Try
Buy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUDQPqxLW30

July - July (1968)

Though July was only together for less than a year, they definitely made their mark on the British psychedelic scene. This is brilliantly crafted pop type psychedelia. "The Way" being one of my favorite on this record. The drum breaks remind me of something you would hear in trip-hop music of today. These songs are trippy, odd, weird and head induced. The more you listen the more fun you will have. This album is clearly influenced by Revolver and Sgt. Pepper's and sounds almost like a lost Beatles album from the late 60's. This is one of those bands that sounds very similar to Olivia Tremor Control, The Sunshine Fix, or any of the Elephant Six bands of today.

Try

Buy

Sunforest - Sounds Of Sunforest (1969)

This is an excellent psych/folk album from the shores of merry old England. You can definitly hear the English folk influences with some songs having an almost renaissance sound. Although what separates this album from so many other english folk albums of the time is the cleary American folk/bluegrass influences that are found in tracks like "Old Cluck" and "Lighthouse Keeper" (they even use a banjo in some songs! The only English folk ive heard to use the instrument). Unlike many other pysch/folk albums that focus more on making the songs seem "dreamy" rather than focusing on song structure, Sunforest writes short, well crafted, catchy folk songs. The rhythm section on this album is spectacular, the bass lines are funky and at the forefront of the recording and the drumming is so crisp that i could see many of the drums tracks being easily sampled for modern day hip hop/trip hop. Although they only lasted a year and released one album to little acclaim, this is close to the top of my list for English acid folk of the period.

Download

Buy (i would post a link to buy if this were still being pressed)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ga_LVA-qux8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PAD3BtEPPc