Psychedelic Music and Drug Addiction

Psychedelic Music and Drug Addiction

“Mom, what the hell are you doing?” Mrs. Avery was shocked to the core to hear her seventeen year old son Billy utter those words. She had only gone up to his room to turn off the music player, which at times was either emanating strange hissing incoherent and incomprehensible sounds or blaring merrily at 2A.M in the morning. Something was just not right. She went up to the bed to check on her beloved son, her only son, whom she had brought up so lovingly. He just rolled over and refused any help, while being atrociously rude all the way. Then she saw and she realized. Two ampules of drugs and a used syringe were peeping from under the bed. Her worst fears had indeed come true. Her son had fallen to the vicious trap, the deadly chain of drug addiction.

Billy’s story is not unfounded for in most of the so-called developed or even developing countries. Majority of people, mostly teenagers try to seek out new thrills by means of experimenting with drugs and other banned hallucinating substances. Seldom do they understand the deadly effects of these mind altering drugs and when they do, they are well beyond the point of no return. And a major fad seems to be listening to mind numbing hallucinating music while tripping. Every now and then, you can hear a casual college boy bragging to his mate about the trip of his life while listening to Pink Floyd or some other psychedelic bands during the last tripping session they had organized.

Indeed, the situation is becoming increasingly bleak day by day, as more and more innocent college students and more pathetically, even some school and high school children are being sucked into this vicious circle. A circle, which once entered, can only be exited either through sheer self control or a stint at the nearest rehabilitation center. That’s the simplest way you can put it around.

The 1960’s era was the time, which marked the advent of bands, which in later stages came to be associated with hallucinating music and were popularly referred to as psychedelic bands. This era saw a revolution in art, music, politics and lifestyle and people became increasingly experimental, trying to throw away the conventional methods to venture out towards the unknown. Even many doctors were ranting and raving about the pleasures of LSD (popularly known as acid among the drug addicts) to the fun loving and trip seeking individuals. And then the music came into the scene. The typical loud, distorted collage of experimental sounds of the music of the era heightened the effects of the drugs by causing a more intense "trip". Popular bands like Pink Floyd, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, and The Who were among the favorites.

Soon, more and more bands started to come into the realms of psychedelic or experimental or acid rock. This kind of music actually tries to replicate the mind numbing hallucinating effects of the various kinds of drugs. Its origins and roots can be traced back to early blues based rock and also a bit of progressive rock, heavy metal and even Indian music’s sitars and ragas. Psychedelic music typically features various instruments like the electric guitar, keyboards, a bit of sitar and tabla, piano, and various vox organs.

The experiments didn’t stop here however. Various studio effects were given to these sounds produced, to help achieve that special feel of being washed away in your dreams after taking drugs. These studio sound effects included phenomenon such as phasing, panning, backward taping, extreme reverb, long delay loops. Psychedelic music lends its uniqueness to long and extended instrumental solos (mostly guitars or keyboards), subtle melody and at times surreal, whimsical lyrics. Even at times, guitarists used to rub their Zippo lighters on the fret board of electric guitars to produce a repetitive hallucinating sound. Syd Barret, the founder member of the band Pink Floyd was a pioneer in this art.

The specific term “psychedelic” was used in popular music by the band “The Holy Modal Rounder” in around 1964. Bands like Jefferson Airplane and The Great Society are popularly hailed as the fore runner in the psychedelic music movement. In due course of time, other bands emerged on the scene, like The Doors, Hawkwind, Byrds and others. However, the most famous of them all was Pink Floyd. They were in a league of their own. They used unique techniques like back masking, reverbs and loops to give that hallucinating feel to their songs. Their songs were the inspiration and a cause to trip for the drug addicts. Till date, they remain as one of the most influential psychedelic bands in the history of music and their live shows are a spectacle of sound, light and experimentation which induces as much dizziness as normal drugs can do.

These bands and their music brought about a change in the people’s lifestyles. It remains to be seen whether the people took to drugs under the influence of the bands’ music or the drugs themselves pushed the addicts towards this type of hallucinating music. Whatever the case may be, it’s an established fact that psychedelic music and drug addiction are intertwined. A psychedelic drug can highly cause physical addiction, major physiological disturbances, craving, disorientation, delirium, or amnesia. Frequent mood swings, arbitrary thoughts and often blank, vacant expressions become the trademark of the persons indulging in substance abuse. However, prolonged use of these hallucinating drugs might lead to incurable diseases like personality disorder, schizophrenia, mental imbalance which might permanently hamper an individual by turning him into a certified lunatic and bringing about a painful slow death later on.

Everyday, more and more new substances are being added to the list of recreational drugs. Classical psychedelic drugs include the likes of LSD, Cocaine, Heroin, psilocybin or magic mushrooms, LSA or Morning Glory seeds. Some people also dig the Ayahuasca or the popular traditional Shamanic tea, which is brewed from plants containing harmaline (a hallucinating substance). Some new kinds of drugs include the likes of “E” or Ecstasy, Nexus, and Foxy Methoxy have enjoyed ample popularity. Herbal psychedelic drugs like the Cannabis or the Marijuana are the widely used psychoactive drugs in the world and they produce hallucinating effects similar to a low dose of a classical chemical psychedelic drug.

The drugs normally work in quite a strange way. It enhances the mood you are presently in. For example it’ll heighten your senses of joy when you are in a fantastic mood and taking a trip with your doses of drugs. However, if you are depressed and dependent on drugs, then the depression will spiral to a long lasting one and eventually your only way out would be a rehabilitation center. Music and its effects on the drug addicts can be seen everywhere in the society. Innumerable musicians, some of them world famous, have fallen prey to the vicious circle of drug addiction. Jimi Hendrix was just 27 when he was found dead in his hotel room. He had choked to death on his own vomit due to severe drug overdose. Jim Morrison, the lead man of the famous band “The Doors” also succumbed to a spree of drug addiction at the tender age of 27. Other notable musicians who have succumbed to drugs include the likes of Syd Barret of Pink Floyd, Tommy Bolin of Deep Purple and many others.

The problem started when innumerable people, mostly students, took to drug addiction being inspired by the lives and deeds of these illustrious musicians. The musicians have been severely criticized over the years for actively or passively promoting drug addiction among youths and their role in motivating youngsters, whether directly or indirectly can not be fully denied. While growing up, the young music loving people always look up to somebody as their idol. And they blindly tend to follow their idol’s footsteps. Moreover, it has become quite a fashion statement or a measurement of your coolness by showing off to the world, the amount of drugs you can inhale. However, the environments around the home or negligence of the parents are also to blame for the drug addiction among the young people.

Basically it’s up to us to curb this demon of drug addiction among today’s youth. While we cannot exactly restrict or ban the production of psychedelic music, we must take adequate steps to see that the drugs and the banned chemical substances are not as easily available as they are today. Parents should be more aware of the substances present in their child’s room and they must be friendly with him or her just to reassure them of their caring presence. More often than not, the addicts feel that they are the loneliest persons in this planet. Parents must try to take care of this fact and find a proper solution by ways of soothing them or by adequate medication.

Proper councilors and psychiatrists must be employed at high schools and colleges to take care of the mental problems and depression of the students. With these proper measures we surely can hope for a better future where music (be it psychedelic or not) will be the sole survivor and that each and drug addict in this world would happily denounce their deadly habit and make their successful comeback to this world.

PS:- Had written this one long ago. Found it while rummaging my drives for particularly nothing.

Edit:- Weee!! Just realized that this is my first post in 2009. Better late than never I believe! :P