The 13th Floor Elevators were an underground psychedelic band (widely regarded as the first band to be called psychedelic) in the mid 1960s, originally formed in Austin,Texas, USA by Roky Erickson, Dan Galindo, Ronnie Leatherman, Benny Thurman, Stacy Sutherland, Tommy Hall, John Ike Walton and Danny Thomas. Erickson was the band's singer, guitarist and primary songwriter, while the Hall's amplified "electric jug"--usually sounding rather like a cuica--remains one of the band's most famous and distinguishing features.

The band had their only US hit, "You're Gonna Miss Me", early in their career. In 1966, came the band's first and most popular album, The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators, which marked the first appearance of the word "psychedelic" in an album title. That was followed by Easter Everywhere (1967), an integrated musical experience, if not a concept album. Drug problems and harassment by law enforcement quickly helped tear the band apart, as Erikson entered a mental hospital in the late 1960s.

Erickson continued to sporadically record and play live in the 1970s, and into the 1980s, through the 1990s and into the 21st Century. The band itself was still considered to be important enough regionally to merit a panel discussion at the 2005 SXSW music festival.