Roky Erickson - I Have Always Been Here Before

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ROKY ERICKSON - I HAVE ALWAYS BEEN HERE BEFORE The Roky Erickson Anthology
Distributor: Shout Factory Reviewer: BF
Generally credited with bringing psychedelia to the US public, the Roky Erickson is high on talent never quite brought to fruition and often lyrical brilliance. I Have Always Been Here Before is a gorgeously put together 30 year career retrospective by Shout! Factory. Erickson’s career began with the 13th Floor Elevators and their Them like big hit You’re Gonna Miss Me and their debut album The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators, big things were expected of this raucous Texan band but following a series of drug busts Erickson took an insanity plea and rather than go to jail Roky found himself spending three years in an asylum for the criminally insane.
Now obviously this is not something you can get over easily and whilst Roky cites this as an incredibly fertile period it has actually meant that Erickson has spend much of the following years a reclusive schizophrenic being stable enough to make only occasional forays into the world of music. All very Syd Barrett then so far but what makes Roky special has been the quality of the music that he has made down the years.
Much of the material on this two disc set dates from the late 60’s and mid 70’s, tracking through the Acid Rock of the Elevators through sci-fi fuelled experiments of his time with the band he named Aliens, the second disc covers music Roky made from the mid 1980’s to the mid 90’s, still left of centre the songs here, whilst still lyrically out there, offers a mellower, Roky with even some folky-country stylings. Roky Erickson is definitely a legendary figure in modern music, a somewhat sad character but this anthology is a gorgeous validation of the man’s music and a classic slice of psychedelic rock in its own right. Very essential.