I can't enjoy The Beatles anymore. | Fab Forum | The Beatles Bible

I’d be interested to see a list of the top 1,000-selling artists since 1956, divided into two groups: those who took drugs and those who didn’t. I bet the former list would be way longer, and the music would be a lot better. My personal list would be headed by The Beatles, but would also include Nirvana, David Bowie, Harry Nilsson, Blondie and LCD Soundsystem, all of whom were either drug addicts or recreational users.

That correlation isn’t to say that drugs are a good thing; it’s more that some good people happen to take drugs. They can hurt and harm a person, but they can also inspire, thrill, improve and influence people for the better. For every Syd Barrett there’s a Paul McCartney .

if you dare say that you’re anti-drug, you will instantly receive countless messages from the world’s stoners, LSD users, etc who will criticize you for being against them, saying how they’re harmless and how all the anti-drug stuff is a lie and whatnot. 

I think the term “drugs” isn’t particularly helpful, because it’s so broad as to be largely meaningless. All drugs are bad? Well, no. Plenty of people are kept alive with drugs. My grandmother died of throat cancer a few years ago, and at the end she was being given so much heroin (diamorphine) that it made her final days as comfortable as possible. Humans have recreationally self-medicated for thousands of years, and we’re still here. Marijuana is not at all like heroin which is very different from ecstasy which is quite unlike LSD which is nothing like crystal meth. This is why “Just say no” is such a terrible policy. When someone experiments and smokes a joint, then finds they don’t die, end up in the gutter or suffer psychosis, does that mean all the other drug stories are myths as well? Not differentiating between the largely benign drugs and the life-destroying ones – or their use and abuse – helps nobody.

I just want to know that there ARE other people out there – including people on this forum – who happily enjoy the band and at the same time believe in a clean lifestyle, like me. Because , really – I do not want to do, or even accept drugs. I really don’t. I was told that they’re dangerous by my parents who cared for me, I’ve stayed away from pretty much all of them (yes, even alchohol) and it’s quite clear that drugs are to blame for the deaths of so many people in history, and are linked to crime, unemployment, depression, relationships falling apart, and all sorts of other negative things.

For what it’s worth, I’m drug-free nowadays (for no particular reason, I just prefer drinking) but did a fair bit of experimentation as a teenager and in my twenties. I don’t regret a thing. Everyone’s welcome to express their opinions here but I’d rather they weren’t judgemental about people’s personal lifestyles and choices. This goes whether a person is pro- or anti-drugs.

Why don’t I do drugs? It’s obvious. I have excellent, loving parents who care about me and always told me as a kid that drugs are dangerous. My life-skills (social studies) teachers said exactly the same thing. I was told outright that, (and yes, I know you’re thinking of Mr. Mackey here) drugs are bad, and if you do them, there will be side-effects that can damage your life and possibly kill you. As a result of being told this, I never came across them, never had any desire whatsoever to do them (and I still will have any desire – the thought of them makes me feel sick) 

You haven’t explained why you are anti-drugs, beyond your parents and teacher telling you that they’re bad, and “because of the fact that they’ve destroyed so many lives and killed so many people.” Do you base your thoughts on religion, politics, fashion, and the Scottish independence question on what your parents and life-skills teachers say you should think, or do you have any natural curiosity to see if what they say is actually true? I always find asking questions and trying things out for myself rather liberating.

It’s not cool to be against drugs in the modern age. Today, it’s considered prudish and cowardly to hate them.

It’s very cool to make a stand for something you believe in. Way better than bowing to peer pressure or blindly accepting cultural norms. Stand up tall and proud.

I’m going to recommend you a book. I’m not trying to change your mind about drugs – you can do them or not do them, it makes no difference to me. The Devil’s Picnic (you can pick up a used copy for $0.01+postage) is about various types of food and drink that have been prohibited in different countries, the effects of ingestion and prohibition, from poppy seeds in Singapore to unpasteurised cheese that cannot be imported into the USA. It’s an interesting book which makes the broader point that what is illegal in one culture is gladly seized upon by another, and what our teachers, politicians or parents would like us not to do is often based on nothing more than fear and misinformation.

When I was a kid, I used to say it’s a great album to play in the summer time. Now, I look at it and see it as just another drug album, and as a result, it hinders my enjoyment of it. I now can’t help but think of drugs when I think of The Beatles.

It’s been asked on this forum before whether it’s possible to divorce a piece of art from its creator, and I guess by extension also from the circumstances surrounding its creation. IIRC it was asked of Chuck Berry being a sex pest, and whether it was OK to still like his music. Did Kurt Cobain and Elliott Smith write some beautiful melodies? Yes they did. Were they also self-destructive heroin addicts? Yes. But I can still listen to their music without enjoying it any less. Others have more of a problem separating life from art, and that’s fine. Whatever works for you works.

TT454 said
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against the band at all, and I know they’ve brought so much happiness to people’s lives and changed music and everything, but it still feels weird to me. After being told by Mum and Dad and my teachers at school about all the bad things drugs have done, and watching a frightening video about people who abuse drugs like LSD, cocaine and heroin, suddenly all these drugs are painted in a normal light, as if they’re an ordinary part of the human experience because The Beatles used them.

For many people they *are* an ordinary part of the human experience. Look at the clothes you are wearing right now (I’m assuming you’re not naked). Someone designed them. Someone else cut and stitched the fabric. Someone else packaged it up. It was posted by a variety of handlers, and probably driven somewhere by a trucker. If you bought it in a shop, someone put it on the racks, someone else keyed in the price and sold it to you. Out of all those people, I can almost guarantee you that someone, somewhere, was a drug user. They weren’t evil, they weren’t thieving, they weren’t on a self-destructive spiral. Just someone getting on with their life, doing things they enjoy doing.

I know, it’s weird, but I listen to many other rock artists, some who may or may not have used drugs, but with The Beatles it’s different because there connection to drug use is absolutely enormous. There’s even a page on this website called “The Beatles and drugs”. It seems as though they are the centre of it all, the leaders of the psychedelic movement who made it look okay to take drug-related risks. Me though? I just loved the music, I never cared for the drug side of it, but it seems as though the drug side of it is pretty much the reason why most people love and respect them.

I wrote that article. It’s more than a page – I think it’s about 10,000 words long, and is consistently in the top five most-popular features on this site. There is a huge amount of interest in this subject, but I don’t think they made it look OK to take risks. The Beatles were always very careful not to promote drug use among their fans. They publicly renounced drugs when they met Maharishi, even though they largely carried on as before behind the scenes. Lennon – probably the biggest fiend of them all – thought it hugely irresponsible to spike people’s drinks, and admitted he was psychologically damaged by LSD.

And you’re wrong to say that most people love and respect The Beatles because of their drug use. They love and respect them because they were enormously talented songwriters, funny people, great looking, sartorial pioneers, studio innovators, appeared in landmark films and a thousand other reasons. If you asked the people of this forum their top five reasons why they liked The Beatles, I don’t think many (any?) would say it had anything to do with drugs.

And they weren’t ahead of the curve, they were just the biggest band on the planet. Probably the first LSD song came out in 1961 (it’s not well known) by a surf guitar group.