Mercury Rev & Beth Orton Perform Bobbie Gentry’s The Delta Sweete

Beginning as avant-pop pranksters and evolving into purveyors of rootsy, majestic psych-pop, Mercury Rev aren’t so much a band as a long, strange trip. The volatility of the band’s early days likely added an extra spark to the one-of-a-kind mix of shoegaze, noise pop, psychedelic, and experimental music on 1991’s Yerself Is Steam and 1993’s Boces, which offered the first hint of just how ambitious their music became later in the decade. As their lineup changed, their musical horizons expanded; on 1995’s See You on the Other Side, they added adventurous free jazz excursions and lullaby-like melodies with striking results.