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Album: Roky Erickson with Okkervil River, True Love Cast Out All Evil (Chemikal Underground)

Andy Gill
Friday 04 June 2010 00:00 BST
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America's very own Syd Barrett, 13th Floor Elevators founder Roky Erickson virtually invented psychedelia and garage-rock before drug abuse and paranoid schizophrenia left him committed to a mental asylum for years.

His first album in 14 years features cris du coeur from the edge of sanity, recalling treatment during which "electricity hammered me through my head", and grappling hopefully with a new world in which "you find out that you have no broken doors". Interspersed with found-sound fragments and recordings made while an inmate, the album features Roky's now whiskery drawl accompanied by fellow Texans Okkervil River on arrangements ranging from the Byrdsy jangle of "Bring Back the Past" to the thundercloud chords of "Goodbye Sweet Dreams".

DOWNLOAD THIS Ain't Blues Too Sad; Goodbye Sweet Dreams; Bring Back the Past

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