In all the times I listened to Tommy by The Who I thought the Acid Queen was a prostitute. I mean the lyrics seem to me to point toward that direction. But this wikipedia article says that the Acid Queen was just somebody who was supposed to give Tommy hallucinegenic drugs and that Underture is Tommy’s psychedelic journey. That also seems to make sense, given the name Aid Queen and the follow-up song. But the lyrics seem to me to clearly indicate a sexual dalliance. So am I completely off base? Or is it a little from column A and a little from column B?
I always took it as a little from column A a little from column B. It’s not that rare for johns to do drugs with their hooker.
Drug dealer? No. LSD was legal in 1969 when the rock opera was written and was widely believed to have promising therapeutic value. So “dealer” is the wrong word. I’d see her more as a Timothy Leary type but deeper underground and without the press agent. I would not interpret her as a prostitute.
By the time the film came out (1975) LSD had been criminalized and demonized so the Acid Queen became similarly more demonic. I just watched that segment of the film this weekend and Tina Turner is still scary as hell in the part.
Tell it to Owsley, kid.
Too right.
More to the point, LSD was also made illegal in the UK in 1966 following the passage of the Dangerous Drugs Act.
For me, and many others of my generation, a first acid trip was a life changing, even mystical experience. The boundaries of the imagination were ripped away and expanded to the horizon.
I never had any doubt the Acid Queen was gonna guide Tommy through that voyage. The line, “Your boy won’t be a boy no more,” could mean she was going to bed him, but it could just as easily refer to the change in perception. Many people back then said, “You’ll never see things the same way again.”
Sure, but guide him how? She can’t talk to him. He can’t tell her what he’s experiencing. Their only communication is likely to be tactile. And to me the lines “Give us a room, close the door/Leave us for a while” strongly suggest a sexual session.
Maybe tactile is enough; besides, she’s a gypsy. Maybe that includes some sort of psychic stuff. I don’t know about you, but I never had a trip without having sex. 
Even more so if you include the next line “Your boy won’t be a boy no more”
From The Story of Tommy (co-written by the man himself):
Of course, knowing Pete, he’s come up with a dozen other explanations since then.
Here’s a little trivia tidbit: even though Tina Turner was the Acid Queen, their original idea was to use Tiny Tim!