Song writing & drugs?

[Skyliners]

I think it

[blue2blue]

Interesting.

 

I'd long thought that some of the very albums cited by others as evidence that drugs didn't have a destructive effect on an artist's work over time were signals of precipitous decline.

 

Of course, it's all subjective. Some folks like "Desolation Row" and some folks like "Simple Twist of Fate," just like some folks like Beethoven's 9th and some folks like John William's Star Wars Medley.

 

 

While I would agree that great art has certainly been made behind some dangerous or just destructive drugs, I don't see the slightest bit of evidence that those drugs don't take their toll. Sooner or later.

 

Whether it s a sudden event like those that took Hendrix, Joplin, Brian Jones, Nick Drake, Brad Newell, Darby Crash and scores -- hundreds, thousands -- of other rockers and creative types -- or gradual decline ending in death or just dreary mediocrity, chronic drug use takes its toll.

 

Drug use, just like all other actions in life, has consequences.

 

 

PS... I really like some of Amy Winehouse's work a lot -- but some of it already shows a real slapdash, lazy streak. If she doesn't get control of her personal life, I'm afraid her professional life will be as big a mess as her personal life all too soon. For every shooting star that flashes across the heavens to a fiery, spectacular end, there are a number of others who just crumble to boring mediocrity and the kind of chronic health problems that long term drug use causes.

[rsadasiv]

Of course, it's all subjective. Some folks like "Desolation Row" and some folks like "Simple Twist of Fate," just like some folks like Beethoven's 9th and some folks like John William's Star Wars Medley.

 

How about "some folks like Beethoven's 1st and some folks like Beethoven's 9th"?

 

Then I could add that I like the late Quartets as well. :poke:

[Blackwatch]

 

I don't think drugs are nearly as significant a negative factor on musicians' productivity as mental illness and poverty are.

 

 

I missed this the first time through. Right on...though I think that a large portion of drug use is self medicating mental issues.

[blue2blue]

How about "some folks like Beethoven's 1st and some folks like Beethoven's 9th"? Then I could add that I like the late Quartets as well. :poke:

 

I was just trying to make sure my snark quotient was high enough to participate fully here. The analogy was not chosen for either accuracy of parallel or any sort of fair-mindedness. In fact, you should read some of the stuff I deleted. (Believe it or not, I delete almost as many of my own ill-considered posts as I do commercial spam. So just imagine some of the stuff I say...)

[hugbot]

Drugs can give you a different perspective on what you're hearing, which can be useful sometimes. But you cant magically do something wasted that you couldnt do sober.

[Lee Knight]

Drugs can give you a different perspective on what you're hearing, which can be useful sometimes. But you cant magically do something wasted that you couldnt do sober.

 

 

That's not true. I can fly when I'm wasted. Seriously. Sober? Can't do it. Wasted? shyeah...

[blue2blue]

Drugs can give you a different perspective on what you're hearing, which can be useful sometimes. But you cant magically do something wasted that you couldnt do sober.

Except maybe hear crap and think it's gold.

 

 

Again, I'm no kind of prohibitionist. But in forty or so years of immersion in the various countercultures, I've seen almost everything... and my own experiences are broad and fairly deep in some areas. (But I'm wised up enough to leave public discussion of particulars right where I have.)

 

Having dealt with myself and other addicts for so long, I'm pretty good at reading denial between the lines. And I feel like I'm reading a fair bit in this thread...

[~GOD~]

i'm unaware of any musicians in the last 50 years whose music i enjoy that never used drugs or smoked herb. in fact, the only sober ones i'm aware of are zappa, shredders, obnoxious idiot country singers, and pre-fab pop types, none of whom appeal to me. i'm not saying there's a causal relationship, but there's definitely a correlation.

[blue2blue]

 

i'm unaware of any musicians in the last 50 years whose music i enjoy that never used drugs or smoked herb. in fact, the only sober ones i'm aware of are zappa, shredders, obnoxious idiot country singers, and pre-fab pop types, none of whom appeal to me. i'm not saying there's a causal relationship, but there's definitely a correlation.

 

Maybe that says a lot more about you than it does about music or creativity.

[~GOD~]

i think you want it to say a lot more about me. i can't even think of any decent always-sober musicians.

pretty much everyone in rock, jazz, hip hop, and rnb used something at some point.

[blue2blue]

I, on the other hand, just wanted to be stupid. Sobriety was always available and on guard against such a desire so my prescription of choice allowed me to achieve stupid in a most rewarding and vacuous way. Complete apathy is very hard to achieve while awake.

[~GOD~]

what have you used, b2b?

[DL2]

what haven't you used, b2b?

Fix'd.

[blue2blue]

Fix'd.

Faux correction duly noted.

 

 

I had a really carefully constructed answer that was not just true but hat made me sound sophisticated, urbane and very worldly... but then I realized I was still playing the what drugs have you used game.

 

So, in order to answer your question on some level, I decided to go private sidebar: check your PMs, ~GOD~.

 

[EDIT: I posted that earlier but it took me a minute and then some to figure out how to try to say what I wanted. So if you checked before and it wasn't there, check again.]

[rockinrobby]

Drugs can give you a different perspective on what you're hearing, which can be useful sometimes. But you cant magically do something wasted that you couldnt do sober.

I can't magically do anything "without mushrooms?"

[blue2blue]

You know, Robby, I'd love to hear you talk sometime because I'm starting to get this sense that every sentence you speak must end in an upnote... your voice rising querulously to meet all those question marks at the end of virtually all your sentences. If we ever start seeing question marks creeping into your lyric posts, I'm calling an intervention.

 

 

 

[DL2]

If we ever start seeing question marks creeping into your lyric posts, I'm calling an intervention.

I'm pretty sure I've seen that once before.

[Jimmy Chaos]

Having tried quite a few drugs to help song writing. I can honestly say the best one for me is a caffeine drink (red bull or similar)

[StreakerOfinsky]

I think it's a good idea for writers (no matter what kind) to experience everything they can experience (short of things that will permanently impair you physically, put you in jail for a long time, etc.). So drugs and songwriting? Sure. Try it.

[blue2blue]

Geez.

 

Try crossing the freeway on foot with a blindfold on, too.

 

Look, as noted, I've been around but it freaks me the hell out to see a bunch of people I'm pretty sure either haven't seen 1/50th of what I've seen and done or are deep in denial blithely advising young writers to use drugs.

 

I'm no prohibitionist, but think about what the hell you're saying, here. Are you people really so sheltered and inexperienced that you don't understand the consequences of the actions you're advising people to take up?

 

I'm practically beyond words, here. (OK, I'm beyond the words I'll let myself use in a forum I moderate. Let me put it that way.) Suffice it to say I think some folks have their heads up someplace the sun has never shined.

 

 

My whole life I've hung around with artists, outlaws, and outsiders.

 

You don't have to tell people to go out and make life-destroying mistakes, to lie, to cheat on their lovers and spouses, to get drunk, get stupid, crash cars, get addicted, neglect family and friends and risk their lives in a thousand ways... we artistic types pretty much find that path on our own, for the most part. And those who don't should probably count themselves lucky.

 

 

 

PS... Just so we're all clear here (since I raised the issue): as a moderator, I'm perfectly fine with a free and frank discussion. No problems here on that front.

 

(Just keep the language more or less PG13, per forum rules, and we're fine.)

 

My pointed comments above are strictly from the point of view of me, who I am and what I've seen.

[DL2]

Depending on chemicals for creativity isn't very creative, is it?

[StreakerOfinsky]

My whole life I've hung around with artists, outlaws, and outsiders.

Me, too. I'd also guess that you're probably not older than I am. I'm old enough that I saw Hendrix live.

 

I'm just not at all anti-drug. I think that drug experimentation, at least, is a good thing, and I've done plenty of it myself in the past. Anything that leads to seeing things from multiple perspectives I think is good. Those experiences were worthwhile, they led to some interesting music, too. I do not think that addiction is a good thing, but people with personalities for that do not need drugs to become addicted to something.

 

I'm also not pro-monogamy, by the way (re the "cheating" comment).

 

I have a weird combination of kinda hippie-ish, kinda libertarian, kinda socialist and kinda anarchist views though.

[blue2blue]

Yeah... like I said, I'm not a prohibitionist. But there's a long way between that and advocating people go out of their way to take up drug use.

 

And I also saw Hendrix live, actually. And, frankly, I'm still a little bummed that he got so loaded he choked to death on his own vomit, but that's happened to people I knew personally, too. It's a fact of substance use/abuse life. I can't tell you how many times I've had to keep turning passed out people over. Maybe that's meddling in a volitional act, I dunno. Maybe we should let 'natural selection' weed out those weak enough to succumb to addiction or just dangerous behavior.

 

But, dang, I wouldn't mind having a few of my personal faves back: Jimi, Janis, Nick Drake, Danny Whitten, Paul Kossoff, Mike Bloomfield, Rory Gallagher, Gram Parsons, Tommy Bolin, John Bonham, Bill Haley, Pigpen, Tim Buckley, Elvis Presley, David Ruffin, Hillel Slovak, Chet Baker, Bon Scott, Rich Grech, Tim Hardin, James Honeyman-Scott, Townes Van Zandt, Keith Moon, Brad Nowell, Gene Vincent...

[rockinrobby]

Maybe we should let 'natural selection' weed out those weak enough to succumb to addiction or just dangerous behavior.

 

 

I knew a girl who was ready to give up because of her addiction? I told her don't give up! "succ um b..."

 

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