Turns out that while incarcerated in Rusk State Hospital for the Criminally Insane during the early 1970s after pleading guilty to a pot possession charge, Roky Erickson, of Texan psych-rock acid-mystics the 13th Floor Elevators, was making music. According to the press release from ANTI-, who will release his latest collection of songs on April 20th, True Love Cast Out All Evil, the first since 2005’s I Have Always Been Here Before, these ‘found-sounds’, along with songs written over the course of his life, are said to form part of the new album that Erickson has recorded with Will Sheff, who, along with his Okkervil River cohorts, provided the backing band for the sessions, while manning the desk as producer. After a prolonged period spent in the musical wilderness, and with a personal life plagued by mental illness, Erickson returned to music in the mid 1990s. Erickson slowly rebuilt his career during a time which saw the re-issue of the 13th Floor Elevators’ catalogue, and the premiere, in 2005, of Keven McAlester’s documentary on Erickson, You’re Gonna Miss Me, culminating in a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Austin Music Awards in 2008. There is no word yet as to whether Erickson and Okkervil River plan to tour the album together, although they have performed together before, at both 2008 and 2009’s SXSW festival, so a 2010 performance doesn’t seem out of the question.
