The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter was the third album by The Incredible String Band, released in March 1968. It is regarded by many as a quintessential example of hippie culture, with its promotion of ideas such as communal living, eastern mysticism and rationalistic pantheism.
The album features a series of vividly dreamlike Robin Williamson songs, such as “The Minotaur‘s Song”, a surreal music-hall parody sung from the point of view of the mythical beast. Its centrepiece is Mike Heron‘s “A Very Cellular Song”, a 13-minute reflection on life, love, and amoebas, whose complex structure incorporates a Bahamian spiritual (“I Bid You Goodnight”, originally recorded by the Pinder Family[1][2]). The last part of “A Very Cellular Song”, “May the Long Time Sun Shine”, is sometimes wrongly referred to as a Sikh hymn or an Irish blessing, but is in fact an original song written by Mike Heron. The album’s layered production style employs multitrack recording techniques[3] and a very wide array of instruments from all corners of the world, including sitar, gimbri, shenai, oud, harpsichord, panpipes, and kazoo.