Raised in the same area and emerging from the same environment as the Rolling Stones, the Pretty Things represented an equally bluesy version of rock and roll and earned an equally notorious reputation as wild, thuggish, and perverse. After all, Dick Taylor, a former Art School classmate of Keith Richards, had been alongside Mick Jagger in the Rolling Stones before Brian Jones. Taylor based their rough tracks on the Chicago style (especially Willie Dixon, from whose song they took their name), although it was singer Phil May who fired up the audience with his antics, a precursor to those of the Doors.

Their drummer Viv Prince was particularly infamous for his fiery playing (and even more for his offstage misbehavior and unhinged persona).

The early repertoire boasts classics such as Rosalyn (1964), with a Bo Diddley-style tribal rhythm, Don't Bring Me Down (1964), Big City (1964), a bouncy rhythm and blues, Honey I Need (1965), a rowdy assault on the Rolling Stones, and Midnight To Six Man (1965), their martial anthem. The first album, Pretty Things (Fontana, 1965), was a collection of rock and roll classics. The band stood out primarily for their wild behavior, which earned them a brief ban from the American scene.

As the English scene emancipated itself from the blues and the violent demands of the mods became felt, the Pretty Things adopted a more "hard" sound. Thus came the boogie Can't Stand The Pain (1965) and the glittering blues of Come See Me (1966), with psychedelic fuzz and Animals-style arrangements.

Their style continued to evolve in the era of the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds and psychedelia, thanks also to a constantly changing lineup. The Pretty Things then moved first to the pop of Progress and then to the acid rock of Defecting Grey (1967). The latter (with John "Twink" Alder of Tomorrow replacing Brokaw on drums) stands out as one of the first collage pieces of British rock (interwoven motifs, tempo changes, sitar, distortion, electronic effects). The album Emotions (Fontana, 1967) even features a classical orchestra. Equally eccentric and hallucinatory was Talking About The Good Times (1968).

Perhaps also thanks to Twink's entrance, the band reached the peak of this new, sophisticated phase with the fourth album, S.F. Sorrow (1968), which vies for the title of first British rock opera (released shortly before Tommy, but a year after Zappa's Absolutely Free). Boasting an eclectic, extravagant, and intricate sound, this collection of heterodox songs is primarily a satori of late British psychedelia, from Private Sorrow to Death and Well Of Destiny. While the pompous Bracelets Of Fingers already evokes the Who of Tommy, the fuzz blasts of Ballon Burning, The Journey, Old Man Going, and the quirky harmonies of She Says Good Morning and I See You seem more like evolutions of the Kinks' composed experiments.

Parachute (Harvest 1970) is instead an album of melodic hard rock, the genre that would ultimately lead to their decline (Cries From The Midnight Circus). The last noteworthy single is perhaps Stone-Hearted Man (1971). Taylor left music, while May continued under the Pretty Things name playing mediocre hard rock.

Singles (Harvest, 1977) collects the hits.

Taylor would return to play with the Mekons in 1985-87.

The band returned to the scene in the late 1990s, first with a remake of their rock opera and then with the album Rage Before Beauty (Snapper, 1999), whose recordings had started in 1981. One must admit that the three key tracks, Passion Of Love (a sort of Them's Gloria), Everlasting Flame (a sort of Stones' Paint It Black), and Vivian Prince (a Bo Diddley-style blues in the late Who's style), are worthy of the band's golden era. All Light Up (2000) is the single that seems to herald a new career.

They still had pretty much the same line-up on Balboa Island (2007), although the sound was much poppier (or tried to be).

May died in 2020. Viv Prince died in 2025.