Were The Beatles better after they started taking drugs?

[Rhythmdvl]

Ah, likely a mixture of hyperbole and counting differences. I don't know anyone (in the circle I'm aware of; this isn't dispositive) that would count multiple hits of acid on one occasion as tripping more than once. Nor would they count dropping multiple hits at different times--while still somewhat under the effect--as tripping multiple times. That's what I meant by you can't trip more than once a day. I guess in earnest you could pack a couple hits in if you didn't sleep (8-9 hour peaking, 4 hours hanging out, dropping again), but that too would be stretching it. To get to 'thousands' of trips, you'd need to dose once a day every day for five years straight.

Again, though, different definitions could be just as valid. The cohort I'm familiar with ranges from the mid-eighties through the mid-nineties, mostly related to the Grateful Dead and raves. What came before surely influenced that scene, and there is a legacy afterwards, but I'd have no idea even what the current slang is nowadays.

[HMS Irruncible]

I thought acid was similar to ecstasy in that there's a short-term tolerance that effectively prevents multiple trips in a short time period. Your receptors simply can't respond to the drug again until they've had 3 days to replenish the serotonin.

So when he says he's taken thousands of acid trips, it's just the recollection of a man who has taken so much of everything that his estimates are way off.

[WordMan]

Ultimately, this question is about nature vs. nurture. Both are contribute to the end result - the human, the music they create etc.

The intersection of their talents and musicial experiences, the emergence of pot and acid, the move from rock n' roll to psychedelic rock, the evolution of the post WW2 teenager to the Summer of Love - all contributed to their music.

I don't know if they were better, per se, as much as the quality of the Beatles' output establishes an amazing narrative which is at the heart of their legend: in the 7-8 years they made records, they went through an amazing creative arc - Tomorrow Never Knows and the back half of Abbey Road could never have been predicted by Love Me Do. It is easy to see why people look for as many factors as they can to see what contributed to such a historically significant artistic evolution and output...

[Mister Rik]

Originally Posted by Enola Gay

That of course is true..drugs won't turn anyone into the Beatles. But if you take a creative genius and give them drugs, it does seem to make them more creative (depending on the drug of course).

Originally Posted by wheresmymind

As to the first part of your question, actually drugs ARE associated with scientific excellence, to a limited degree. Many big-idea, paradigm-shifting (to use a completely overused phrase) breakthroughs are largely the result of relatively simple, creative solutions to puzzles that have stumped scientists for years. "Hey, what if the speed of light is always the same no matter how fast you're moving?"

I'm just about finished reading Steve Jobs' biography, and he claimed more than once that taking LSD in his youth was one of the most important things he ever did.

[Vinyl Turnip]

Originally Posted by Clothahump

[b]Not just no, but hell no. They really flushed themselves down the toilet with drugs.

Yeah, Lennon was so high he walked right into the path of a bullet. George contracted lung cancer from--- what's the name of that illegal drug? Oh yeah, tobacco.

Can't even remember the names of the other two offhand, but I'm sure they never amounted to much.

[woodstockbirdybird]

Originally Posted by Clothahump

Were The Beatles better after they started taking drugs?


Not just no, but hell no. They really flushed themselves down the toilet with drugs.

Indeed. Most people knowledgeable about music consider Rubber Soul through Abbey Road their weak period.

[Marley23]

Originally Posted by Mister Rik

I'm just about finished reading Steve Jobs' biography, and he claimed more than once that taking LSD in his youth was one of the most important things he ever did.

I don't think taking LSD had much to do with his success. I think the fact that he was the kind of guy who tried LSD and maintained an interest in what you might call hippie stuff reflected the qualities that made him distinctive and successful. And while I'm at it I will point out that if he'd had as much trust in modern medicine as he did in the value of psychedelic experiences, he could be here telling us about it himself.

[Mister Rik]

Originally Posted by Marley23

I don't think taking LSD had much to do with his success.

Perhaps not, but he believed it did.

And while I'm at it I will point out that if he'd had as much trust in modern medicine as he did in the value of psychedelic experiences, he could be here telling us about it himself.

No argument there.

[Yookeroo]

Originally Posted by Cosmic Relief

I thought acid was similar to ecstasy in that there's a short-term tolerance that effectively prevents multiple trips in a short time period. Your receptors simply can't respond to the drug again until they've had 3 days to replenish the serotonin.

Right. He wasn't taking acid every day. Once or twice a week at the most.

[JCorre]

Originally Posted by WordMan

Ultimately, this question is about nature vs. nurture. Both are contribute to the end result - the human, the music they create etc.

The intersection of their talents and musicial experiences, the emergence of pot and acid, the move from rock n' roll to psychedelic rock, the evolution of the post WW2 teenager to the Summer of Love - all contributed to their music.

I don't know if they were better, per se, as much as the quality of the Beatles' output establishes an amazing narrative which is at the heart of their legend: in the 7-8 years they made records, they went through an amazing creative arc - Tomorrow Never Knows and the back half of Abbey Road could never have been predicted by Love Me Do. It is easy to see why people look for as many factors as they can to see what contributed to such a historically significant artistic evolution and output...

I opened this thread precisely to see what you would have to say about it Wordman. In your opinion do you appreciate the Beatles music more before or after, let's say "Rubber Soul"?

Let me say that I really admire your contributions to this board and esteem your opinions on musical topics in the highest regard.

I love the band and I would say that, if put on a scale, the amount of quality songs they wrote after that album outweigh the ones they wrote before it. However mine is an amateur opinion and I'd welcome a more informed viewpoint.

[WordMan]

Originally Posted by JCorre

I opened this thread precisely to see what you would have to say about it Wordman. In your opinion do you appreciate the Beatles music more before or after, let's say "Rubber Soul"?

Let me say that I really admire your contributions to this board and esteem your opinions on musical topics in the highest regard.

I love the band and I would say that, if put on a scale, the amount of quality songs they wrote after that album outweigh the ones they wrote before it. However mine is an amateur opinion and I'd welcome a more informed viewpoint.

Really? Thank you.

Well, my favorite album is Revolver, so I must come down on the side of preferring the music from Rubber Soul and beyond. But each period is great for different reasons.

- With the stuff leading up to Rubber Soul, they demonstrate great pop songcraft, just like Motown writers, Chuck Berry, The Beach Boys and the Brill Building writers like Goffin and King, Ellie Greenwich, etc. Please Please Me, I Want to Hold Your Hand, etc. are pop craft perfection.

- With Help, Rubber Soul and Revolver, they take that pop song vocabulary and start to stretch it in different directions. Songs are still verse chorus verse, but move into different subject matter, use different arrangements and suggest that the pop song form can be used to make real, artistic statements, not just pop confections. Tomorrow Never Knows slips past some of these constraints and heralds the move to a new phase.

- From Tomorrow Never Knows, Sgt. Pepper and beyond, they move past traditional pop songcraft and use the jumping off point of psychedelia to give more free range to their musical ideas.

So, from a stepping-back standpoint: I, personally, happen to prefer their middle and late periods, but the whole point to this OP is anchored more in the fact that the Beatles had a large creative arc - and the arc was of consistent high quality even as it evolved - oh, and at key points in the arc, drugs were introduced as a factor - pot in '65 and acid a year or two later.

So I don't think the Beatles were better, per se, as much as their push to innovate creatively coincided with both the introduction of drugs and a wider culture at the time that was ready to push past traditional music structures and sounds. The fact that their output was high quality throughout this rather seismic transition both musically and culturally is what remains fascinating and historic.

Does that help?

[JCorre]

Great analysis, thank you.

[Enola Gay]

Originally Posted by Rhythmdvl

Ah, likely a mixture of hyperbole and counting differences.

Looks like George Harrison agrees with you:

I don’t think John had a thousand trips; that’s a slight exaggeration. But there was a period when we took acid a lot…

Originally Posted by Cosmic Relief

I thought acid was similar to ecstasy in that there's a short-term tolerance that effectively prevents multiple trips in a short time period. Your receptors simply can't respond to the drug again until they've had 3 days to replenish the serotonin.

Now that is interesting and makes me wonder if it is then impossible to become physically addicted to lsd. You always hear about people becoming addicted to heroine, oxycontin, alcohol, etc. But I've never heard of an acid-addict.

Originally Posted by Mister Rik

I'm just about finished reading Steve Jobs' biography, and he claimed more than once that taking LSD in his youth was one of the most important things he ever did.

I have never taken lsd, so I don't know if it actually does "expand your mind", if users just perceive it that way, if people with expansive minds are more likely to try it, or what, but here are some interesting Beatles quotes:

Ringo: I think LSD changes everybody. It certainly makes you look at things differently.

George: The first time I had acid, a light bulb went on in my head and I began to have realizations which were not simply, “I think I’ll do this,” or “I think that must be because of that.” The question and answer disappeared into each other. An illumination goes on inside: in ten minutes I lived a thousand years.

Paul: Pot and LSD were the two other major influences. Instead of getting totally out of it and falling over, as we would have done on Scotch, we’d end up talking very seriously

And having just read thru some of their descriptions of "bad trips"....I think 'just say no' group should change their strategy. Hearing about those bad trips is enough to scare anyone straight.

[HMS Irruncible]

Originally Posted by Enola Gay

Now that is interesting and makes me wonder if it is then impossible to become physically addicted to lsd. You always hear about people becoming addicted to heroine, oxycontin, alcohol, etc. But I've never heard of an acid-addict.

Physically no, but you can imagine how someone who feels like they've become one with the universe might feel like LSD is the only thing really worth doing anymore (see all the messianic LSD figures from the 60's, Tim Leary, etc).