JOUR 420: B#4

The Drug Life

Drugs and music -- they seem to go hand-in-hand...or at least that was the notion in the early days of rock music. 

Everybody has heard the expression Sex, Drugs, and Rock n' Roll. There's even a TV show on FX with that same title. And beginning in the late 1960's into the '70's was the hippie belief that all of these elements, when brought together, created the perfect mix. Almost all musicians in the rock industry, and then in the music industry as a whole, realized that drugs were part of the normal way of living, and for many, it didn't have the best ending.

They might have functioned thinking: "I didn't choose the drug life, the drug life choose me." But this quickly led to addiction for many, and eventually their downfall.

As Michael Walker describes in his book, Laurel Canyon, "Whenever cocaine actually arrived, there is universal agreement that it leeched whatever charm and innocence, real or imagined, the canyon scene still possessed. Whereas pot and acid were seen as tools of enlightenment...(Walker 156)." 

Drugs such as cocaine, LSD, heroin had become the "preferred refreshment" in the industry.

I am not going to include marijuana in all of this, because it is not a lethal drug. Weed was very popular back in the hippie movement, and remains very popular today, but there has not been a single musician who has lethally died or overdosed on marijuana (just ask Willie Nelson and Snoop Dogg).

Jimi Hendrix

In the 1960's, there were only three drug-related deaths to famous musicians. In the 1970's, the drug death toll skyrocketed. Some of the famous names that died from overdosing included Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison (The Doors), Gram Parsons (The Byrds), Elvis Presley, and Sid Vicious (Sex Pistols).

There were certain old school artists that I enjoy listening to up to this day, which include musicians such as Rick James and David Ruffin (The Temptations). 

David Ruffin

After rising to stardom as the lead singer of the Temptations, Ruffin gained a large ego and eventually was kicked out of the band. Part of the reason for this was because of the drug addiction that he had gained. In 1991, Ruffin was found dead with cocaine in his system. James on the other hand did not hide his love for drugs. He was one of the first artists who created a song entirely about weed (Mary Jane). Over time, interesting stories would surface about James' drug-life with loose women and other crazy factors. In 2004, James died of heart failure, and his autopsy revealed that he had up to seven drugs in his bloodstream at time of death, including cocaine.

There hasn't been much slowing down in drug-related deaths. From the '70's into the 2000's, there were many lives taken due to overdosing. This undoubtedly had an impact on the average music listener. For the people who loved certain musicians so much, that they wanted to be like them or relate to them as much as possible, even if that meant through drugs. With that said, there is no denying that drugs influenced music and pop culture forever. 

So where do we draw the [white] lines?

Well, first we have acknowledge that not every musician was a drug addict. Some had risen above the peer pressure of the industry and took a stand against the culture. The group Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five for example created the song White Lines (original music video) to warn against the dangers of cocaine.

Artists such as Eminem was once heavily involved in drugs and alcohol, but eventually came clean, and writes about his addiction through multiple albums, most notably Recovery. One of his biggest motivations was not only his health, but living a better life for his daughters. He tells this story through the song Not Afraid, where one of his rhymes includes:

It was my decision to get clean, I did it for me

Admittedly, I probably did it subliminally

For you, so I could come back a brand new me you helped see me through

And there were artists that were completely anti-drug: As mentioned many times in the book, Frank Zappa was beloved by the hippies, but never used drugs himself. Artists such as Bruce Springsteen, Gene Simmons, Rod Stewart and even Tyler the Creator have all identified themselves as anti-drug musicians. 

Although there has always been some kind of a voice against the drug movement, I think that as time has passed, today's music industry is still filled with drug-addicts simply due to the peer pressure and the constant stress of the industry. Maybe not as much as it once was in the 1970's-1990's, but it's still there. This doesn't just include cocaine, heroin, or LSD as mentioned in Laurel Canyon, but more than ever, there seems to be deaths related to prescription drugs.

The most recent example of this was the death of Prince in 2016. He was never addicted to drugs such as cocaine or heroin. But rather, he died from an overdose on Fentanyl, a very strong yet highly addictive pain killer.

Prince

Drugs have influenced the culture of music, and that influence still remains today, as more and more drugs come from the streets and the pharmacy. Hopefully, the voice against life-threatening and addictive drugs can grow stronger as well.