Various ‎Artists – "Simla Beat 71" (India Tobacco Company Limited ‎– 33ITC.2) 1971

The notes on the back sleeve are as priceless as the charmingly feral music....dig this:

"It's been a long time away. Yes, pop music's really leapt bounds from those way back days of Bill Hailey and His Comets. Remember?
A lot of sound has blown since. The Beatles came, took over the scene, then split into bits.
Janis Joplin toppled out as the Queen of White Soul. The first one ever. She flipped out 'tripping' and never came back. Jimi Hendrix bludgeoned into focus. Then turned within and died too.
But a lot of men didn't. Bob Dylan's changed his music, his songs, his message. The Rolling Stones are much together. Hundreds of new groups, several new traditions, a series of revivals and refinds (B. B. King, a great one) have happened and are happening still.
Pop music is India began by being derivative. There's a lots of that still. But there are more Pop Groups here now than ever before. What's a new turn is there's heaps of original work. Much of it worth the world pop scene. Beat shows gell more often. Groups deal out music more seriously. Commitment. And heavy involvement. And backing the growing pop music scene in India is India Tobacco Company Limited. By sponsoring the biggest annual pop music happening- The All India Simla Beat Contest. Last year it was great. This year even more. And this is only the start...
Now over to you and the winners this year. All featured on this L.P."

The India Tobacco Company were not satisfied with sharing out as many carcinogens as possible to the youth of India,they also provided the only opportunity any of these sub-continental Psych groups had to ever appear on vinyl.

Here are the 1971 Simla contest winners for your much needed course of psychedelic radio therapy.

Tracklist:

A1 –The Fentones - Simla Beat Theme
A2 –Nomads - Nothing Is The Same
A3 –Hipnotic Eye - Killing Floor
A4 –Mini Beats - Hey Gipsy Girl
A5 –Velvette Fogg - I Am So Glad
B1 –The Black Beats - The Mod Trade
B2 –The Eruptions - I Am Gonna Erupt
B3 –The Fentones - Until The Dawn
B4 –Brood Of Vipers - Psychedelic Web
B5 –The Eruptions - You Can't Judge A Book
B6 –Hipnotic Eye - Aimless Lady

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Various ‎Artists – "Simla Beat 70" (India Tobacco Company Limited ‎– 33 I.T.C. 1) 1970

Craaazy maaan, 'cus emblazened on the back cover is this wild synopsis:

"Beat, man, beat.
Man hears the violent waves over the rocks. The gentle patter of rain on dried leaves. He hears more. Rhythm in nature. Rhythm that is hypnotic. And, he imitates nature on the drum...
So music was born.
And, he becomes a slave...bound to music in every facet of his life. He hears music in the tinkle bells of the lowing hers. In the whisper of the sighing boughs. He laughs. He cries. He dances. As the music moves him.
Today he wants to be free. Free from all ties. Even of music. Today, he bursts forth in glorious abandon.
Today is beat music.
Soul-stirring, sinuous music. That finds echo in the hearts of the young. People who are alive.
The young at heart and the alive are in India, too. But they were drifting...
In their own wild ways. In sporadic bursts of enthusiasm all over the country... till 1968 when the oldest cigarette company with a young heart came along. India Tobacco Company with their annual 'All India Simla Beat Contest'."

Well, thank you????, India Tabacco Company for freeing the young of India whilest plying them with your toxic products.

What became evident during the Simla Beat contests was that Indians were as bad at playing western music as those from the west were at playing theirs.

Yes it takes a lifetime to learn how to twang the Sitar,but less well publicised is that it also takes a lifetime to learn how to play rock'n'roll,and all of its subtle offshoots......one of which is the particular brand of 1965 vintage Garage-Psych that the youth of India seem to have taken to heart in 1970.

Its an infectiously charming take on The Seeds and the 13th Floor Elevators style of garage psychedelia that never made it into the garages of 1966.I don't think LSD hit India until later in the decade,and thank Ganesh it didn't or we wouldn't have had the pleasure of hearing these unspoilt naive throwback psych masterpieces....Beat, Man, Beat indeed.

Tracklist:

A1 –Confusions - Voice From The Inner Soul 3:03
A2 –Dinosaurs - You Can't Beat It 2:56
A3 –X'Lents - Psychedelia 2:55
A4 –Innerlite - Zorba's Dance 3:23
A5 –Genuine Spares - Proper Stranger 3:48
A6 –Genuine Spares - What's Going On 2:47
B1 –Dinosaurs - Sinister Purpose 3:12
B2 –Great Bear - Mist 7:21
B3 –X'Lents - Born On The Bayou 4:17
B4 –Innerlite - Baby Baby Please 2:27

DOWNLOAD a similar beat HERE!

Various Artists ‎– "Psych Funk Sa-Re-Ga! Seminar: Aesthetic Expressions Of Psychedelic Funk Music In India 1970-1983" ( World Psychedelic Funk Classics ‎– WPFC 103CD) 2010

Klaus Doldinger, nows there's a fine Indian name for ya?

I doubt that the Indians featured on these Funky Psychedelic Wig-outs were actually all Germans,though it wouldn't surprise me.I have every confidence that our sub-continental brothers and sisters were more than capable of making these Bollywood versions of the 'Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls' soundtrack. Fuzz guitar dueting with haunting Indian Flutes,lead trumpets flirting with a funky drummer beat, like Ennio Morricone backing the Electric Prunes....before they got God forced on them by Axelrod.

Pretty weird stuff indeed,but more than that, it's pretty weird stuff that you can dance to. This is what happens when two cultures clash, for real, and not a single hippy in sight!

Tracklist:

1 –The Black Beats - The Mod Trade 4:11
2 –X'Lents - Psychedelia 2:53
3 –Kalyanji Anandji - Somebody To Love  2:13
4 –Kalyanji Anandji - Bairaag Dance Music 2:42
5 –R. D. Burman - Dance Music From Hare Rama Hare Krishna 2:15
6 –R. D. Burman - Lekar Ham Diwana Dil 5:52
7 –R. D. Burman - Freak Out Music 3:18
8 –Bappi Lahari - Everybody Dance With Me 2:57
9 –Kalyanji Anandji with R. D. Burman - Dharmatma Theme Music 3:53
10 –Asha Bhosle - Dum Maro Dum Live 3:20
11 –Usha Khanna - Hotel Incidental Music  1:13
12 –Klaus Doldinger - Sitar Beat 1:32
13 –Sapan Jagmohan - Meri Aakhon Mein Ek Sapna Hai 2:57
14 –Keith Kanga - Butterfly (Version Two) 3:27
15 –Atomic Forest - Mary Long 3:15
16 –Usha Khanna - Tera Jasia Pyara Koi Nahin 5:29
17 –Hemant Bhosle - Phir Teri Yaad 3:15
18 –R. D. Burman - Aaj Mera Dil 5:29
19 –Kalyanji Anandji - Hum Tumhe Chate Hain 5:43
20 –Ilaiyaraaja Feat. Vani Jairam & Chorus - Thabimayil 4:14

DOWNLOAD the funky junkies of India HERE!

Ananda Shankar - "Sa-Re-Ga Machan" ( His Master's Voice ‎– ECSD 2636) 1981

Behold!Ananda's cheesy tribute to the animal kingdom.
All his years of 'classical training' is tossed in the bin,and his Led Zeppelin influence has long been foresaken in favour of the James Last Orchestra.He has a style that has rivited together all the various aspects of eastern and western culture that results in a mixture not quite as good as either,but in a way is far more entertaining.This album is a bit late to call it Psychsploitation, but time passes slowly in India,so here you are....Psychsploitation from the early eighties,which was the begininning of that truly awful, bourgeois, 'World Music' phenomenon;so perhaps this is a Globalsploitation album for Peter Gabriel worshiping city traders and suchlike.The 'we're not racist cus we like african music' crowd......all are now Ukipers,Trump supporters, and Brexit voters to the man.

Tracklist:

1 Birds In The Sky
2 Can't Help falling In Love
3 Charging Tiger
4 Dancing Peacocks
5 His Latest Flame
6 How Would You Like To Be?
7 Jungle King
8 Jungle Symphony
9 Monkeys' Tea Party 
10 Night In The Forest
11 Playful Squirrels
12 Romantic Rhino     
13 Sa-Re-Ga Machan

14 Teddy Bear

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Ananda Shankar ‎– "Ananda Shankar" - (Reprise Records ‎– RS 6398) 1970

"His Name Is Ananda. He's a young man with a sitar and a dream and his name means peace and joy.
He's as Indian as the tradition in which he recieved his education as a classical musician.
But he's excited about Led Zeppelin and Janis Joplin and electronic music. " ....thats what it says in the liner notes anway.

This 'young man with a sitar and a dream' was the funky nephew to the more famous and far more boring Uncle Ravi,who spent most of his later years hanging with the Beatles and fathering scores of illegitimate children all over California.
At least Ananada is a 'proper' indian,and he can play the Sitar properly...if the wanted to;but the real dosh lay in doing naff versions of 'Light My Fire' rather than anything interesting.
I sold this album for 175 quid in the early noughties,before it got reissued on CD. Its Cheesy, its silly, but I do adore the final track rather a lot.Stuff that in yer pipe and smoke it Uncle Ravi. 

Tracklist:

A1 Jumpin' Jack Flash 3:40
A2 Snow Flower 3:10
A3 Light My Fire 3:29
A4 Mamata (Affection) 2:50
A5 Metamorphosis 6:49
B1 Sagar (The Ocean) 13:13
B2 Dance Indra 3:49
B3 Raghupati 3:35

DOWNLOAD the other shankar HERE!

Sai Baba ‎– "Embodiment Of Love" (Premasound ‎– PS 108) 2000

As previously stated, Alice Coltrane bore a passing resemblance to Cult leader and serial pervert Shri Sathya Sai Baba. He also shared another trait with the lovely Alice, in the fact that he made records of his incredibly creepy devotional music.
This is a common behaviour within the world of the cult leader. David Koresh, Chuck manson and Rev Jim Jones all have records out there, but I think our Sai made the creepiest ones.Just waiting for some Islamic State albums to hit the market,and I'll be happy.
Sai's sexual crimes have been well documented,and looking at the album cover you have to wonder what the fuck is he doing with his hands?.......he looks like he's wanking off to me!?
With a specific taste in deflowering young boys, "The Embodiment Of Love", the album's title, forced a little bit of my stomach contents back into my mouth.In the case of some of his younger followers,I dread to think what their stomach contents were after visting the holy one in his personal tent!?
It's all Alice Coltranes fault,but i feel a detour into the creepy land of Cult music coming on......and I don't mean 'The Cult', i mean religious and hippie Doomsday cults.....so expect some Amon Duul,Chuck Manson and The Church Universal and Triumphant with Rev Elizabeth Claire.If you thought the music you like was weird,this stuff is a special kind of fresh madness.

Tracklist:

1 Khanda Kandânthara 5:27
2 Muralî Gâna Lola 8:52
3 Jânedu 2:54
4 Sarva Velala 9:12
5 Sathya Dharma Prema 6:39
6 Anthuleka 3:22
7 Na Punyam Bhauya Manasu 11:02
8 Viswasânthini 4:13
9 Gayatri Mantra 5:07

DOWNLOAD from the wandering fingers of Sai baba and his creepy cult member HERE!