Maybe the first time you heard of him was from a skateboard part, or the Corey Duffel interview on 1817. The first time I heard about Roky Erickson, I was blown away! Roky Erickson & the 13th Floor elevators were one of the few to pioneer the masive wave of psychedelic music, and grew to be remembered as wild and chaotic. I bought a DVD biography of him about a year ago...wow, he has had quiet the life. To this day Roky Erickson is still known for one of the most unusual artists, especially his voice,.Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top) describes it as, "crazy." The famous Janis Joplin took a lot of her stage presence and style from Roky.
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The 13th floor elevators took off in 1965. Their first biggest hit off "Psychedelic Sounds" Hit #1 in San Francisco, CA. The band manager of the elevators Tommy Hall wanted the band "more psychedelic" so he supplied drugs. Thats how acid took over Rokys life. A little later after some shows and whatnot, Roky started seeing a doctor and eventually his final diagnosis was Schizophrenia. 1968 He ran off to San Fran. and kept saying that he was hearing evil voices in his head, all the time. Little later heroin came into his life. Then found he came across hepatitis from a dirty needle.
Eventually, he was caught with the drugs, brought to court and was tried as insane. They sent him off to a mental hospital. He sat up day after day there writing lyrics. During the stay in the mental hospital he played music with other patents, all who were murders, rapists, some real spooky sick people. They gave him shock treatment, in other words, electric current to cause controlled seizures for the purpose of psycho treatment. After he got out of the institute, his mother told him to perform some songs he had been writing. Here is one of them.
Eventually, he was caught with the drugs, brought to court and was tried as insane. They sent him off to a mental hospital. He sat up day after day there writing lyrics. During the stay in the mental hospital he played music with other patents, all who were murders, rapists, some real spooky sick people. They gave him shock treatment, in other words, electric current to cause controlled seizures for the purpose of psycho treatment. After he got out of the institute, his mother told him to perform some songs he had been writing. Here is one of them.
He started taking his lyrics, and where ever he had written "God" he changed to "Lucifer." That was all with Roky Erickson & The Aliens. Roky started believing that he was an alien, creature, demon or a ghosts and that earth people where going to zap him. So his current wife made a fake document for him to sign that he was not human.
The document is on the bottom of this movie. I suggest you watch this movie. Most musicians can't have huge times from 70's all the way into early days. Roky Erickson did. His brother and a therapist took care of Roky in 2006-07. He is doing a lot better today.
Listen to more songs of Roky Erickson HERE
