Electric Eden: Unearthing Britain's Visionary Music

Rob Young's Electric Eden: Unearthing Britain's Visionary Music is a seminal book on British music and cultural heritage, spanning the visionary classical and folk traditions from the nineteenth century to the present day.

The book has garnered widespread acclaim, with the Guardian calling it "a thoroughly enjoyable read and likely to remain the best-written overview for a long time." The New Statesman describes it as "a perfectly timed, perfectly pitched alternative history of English folk music... wide-ranging, insightful, authoritative, thoroughly entertaining." Simon Reynolds hails it as "a stunning achievement," and Caught By The River simply states, "A masterpiece." Further praise includes "Excellent... blissfully quotable" from the New York Times, "An authoritative account" from The Times, "Consistently absorbing" from the Independent, and "An impassioned and infectious rallying cry of a book" from the Sunday Times.

In this groundbreaking survey of over a century of music-making in the British Isles, Rob Young investigates how the idea of folk has been handed down and transformed by successive generations – including song collectors, composers, Marxist revivalists, folk-rockers, psychedelic voyagers, free festival-goers, experimental pop stars, and electronic innovators.

In a sweeping panorama of Albion's soundscape, the book takes in the pioneering spirit of Cecil Sharp; the pastoral classicism of Ralph Vaughan Williams and Peter Warlock; the industrial folk revival of Ewan MacColl and A. L. Lloyd; the folk-rock of Fairport Convention, Sandy Denny, Nick Drake, Shirley Collins, John Martyn, and Pentangle; the bucolic psychedelia of The Incredible String Band, The Beatles, and Pink Floyd; the acid folk of Comus, Forest, Mr Fox, and Trees; the influence of The Wicker Man and occult folklore; the early Glastonbury and Stonehenge festivals; and the visionary pop of Kate Bush, Julian Cope, and Talk Talk. Electric Eden meticulously maps out a native British musical voice that reflects the complex relationships between town and country, progress and nostalgia, radicalism and conservatism.

An attempt to isolate the 'Britishness' of British music – a wild combination of pagan echoes, spiritual quest, imaginative time-travel, pastoral innocence, and electrified creativity – Electric Eden will be treasured by anyone interested in the tangled story of Britain's folk music and Arcadian dreams. Time Out calls it "a treat," Mojo notes Young is "a fine writer," Uncut finds his "immense narrative is both educative and gripping," and the TLS praises it as "a multitudinous, fascinating and beautifully written account."