Today, the 13th Floor Elevators continue to influence new generations of musicians. Seminal
punk rock band
Television played the Elevator's song "Fire Engine" live in the mid-1970s. In the 1980s and 1990s, the 13th Floor Elevators influenced bands such as
Primal Scream,
the Shamen,
Lime Spiders,
the Jesus and Mary Chain and
Spacemen 3, all of whom covered their songs, and
14 Iced Bears who use an
electric jug on their single "Beautiful Child", as well as
The Black Angels in "Sunday Afternoon". In 1990, 21 contemporary bands—including
R.E.M.,
ZZ Top,
Richard Lloyd,
the Jesus and Mary Chain, and Primal Scream—recorded covers of Elevators and solo Erickson songs on
Where the Pyramid Meets the Eye: A Tribute to Roky Erickson, one of the first
tribute albums. In 2005, a panel at the
SXSW music festival discussed the music of the Elevators and
Powell St. John, one of the Elevators' songwriters. "You're Gonna Miss Me" was covered by Australian group
Radio Birdman on the 1978 release of their album
Radios Appear. The song "Reverberation" was covered by
Echo & the Bunnymen in 1990, with singer
Noel Burke. 1980s drone/space-rock band
Spacemen 3 were influenced by the 13th Floor Elevators, covering "Rollercoaster" twice, for their debut album,
Sound of Confusion, and as a 17-minute version for their debut EP ''Walkin' With Jesus''. Vocalist/guitarist
Pete Kember also covered "Thru the Rhythm" with his post-Spacemen 3 project
Spectrum. "Slip Inside This House" was covered by Scottish alternative rock band Primal Scream (on their album
Screamadelica), by Norwegian band
Madrugada, by New York noise rock band
Oneida (on their 2000 album ''Come on Everybody Let's Rock
), and by electronic band The Shamen on their 1992 promo, Make It Mine''.
Le Bonne Route, a 1996 album by
Deniz Tek of
Radio Birdman, features a song titled "Lunatics at the Edge of the World", which Tek described as "An ode to
Syd Barrett and Roky Erickson." In the 2000 movie
High Fidelity, "You're Gonna Miss Me" is heard in the opening scene, and is the first song on the movie soundtrack album. In 2006,
Dell Computers used "You're Gonna Miss Me" in a television ad for their XPS laptop. On April 24, 2007, during a radio promotion/interview before a concert,
Jesse Lacey of
Brand New credited the inspiration and a few lyrics for the song
Degausser to Roky Erickson. In 2007, the band's biographer Paul Drummond published his first book,
Eye Mind: The Saga of Roky Erickson and The 13th Floor Elevators, which was based upon an extensive oral history. In 2009, "You're Gonna Miss Me" was used at length during a scene in episode 21 of
Alan Ball's HBO series
True Blood, culminating in a frantic, ultimately unsuccessful attempt by
Lafayette Reynolds and Lettie Mae Thornton to remove
Tara Thornton from the demonic influence of
maenad Maryann Forrester. The band has also been an influence on the "
stoner rock" scene. Bands such as
Queens of the Stone Age,
Nebula, and Names and Faces regard them as an important influence. Noted Hollywood actor
Johnny Depp praised the Elevators in a 2004 interview with
Esquire magazine: "Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators, a band out of Texas. They were basically the first psychedelic-rock band. 1965. And if you listen to old 13th Floor Elevators stuff—Roky Erickson especially, his voice—and then go back and listen to early Led Zeppelin, you know that Robert Plant absolutely copped everything from Roky Erickson. And it's amazing. And Roky Erickson is sitting in Austin, Texas; he's just there. And Robert Plant had a huge hit. It always goes back to those guys, you know? I love those fucking guys."
Parquet Courts, a band which includes two native Texans, included a cover of “Slide Machine” on 2014's
Content Nausea. Texas recording artist
Ray Wylie Hubbard sang "No band was cooler than the 13th Floor Elevators" in his song "Screw You, We're from Texas" from his 2003 album
Growl. On January 19, 2014, the song "The Kingdom of Heaven (Is Within You)" was featured at the end of
episode 2 of
True Detective. In 2020, writer Paul Drummond published, through
Anthology Editions, his second book on the group with "an unprecedented catalog of primary materials—including scores of previously-unseen band photographs, rare and iconic artwork of the era, items from family scrapbooks and personal diaries, new and archival interviews, dozens of contemporaneous press accounts, and no shortage of Austin Police Department records." Various Elevators tribute/related bands exist, such as the John Ike Walton Revival, featuring namesake John Ike Walton and Fred Mitchim, the Tommy Hall Schedule featuring Fred Mitchim, and Acid Tomb, featuring members of
the Alice Rose. Erickson's youngest brother Sumner Erickson covers many Elevators songs with his band the Texcentrics. ==Discography==