Get all your news in one place.
100's of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Alexis Petridis, Ben Beaumont-Thomas and Laura Snapes

The ear-rattling psychedelia of Brighton’s Oral Habit and the week’s best new tracks

Oral Habit.
Oral Habit. Photograph: Milo Costelloe

From Brighton
Recommended if you like Osees, Ty Segall, the noisier bits of King Gizzard
Up next Currently working on a debut album for release next year.

A city with its own psych festival, and indeed a gig promotion company called Acid Box, Brighton has no shortage of lysergic left-field rock bands. But while most of their local contemporaries tend to the more recumbent end of the psychedelic spectrum, Oral Habit deal in what they call “the ear-rattling psychic dream of choked-up acid punks”, a sound that feels overpowering, explosive and intense: you could say it’s more closely aligned to the disoriented racket of mid-60s freakbeat than the pie-eyed beatitudes of the Summer of Love; equally you could suggest it’s a very contemporary form of psychedelia, rebooted for the troubled, disturbing climate of 2025.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100's of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.