# Best anti-drug message in rock **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 31, 2006, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712 "2006-07-31T14:09:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/41 "2006-07-31T22:28:52Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] Cite? [/QUOTE] You supplied the cites yourself: the published sheet music, the promo video…you just declared them wrong. So I can only cite the song itself. Got it right here on the trusty iPod, checked it once again before posting. Yep, John is saying T-H-I-N-K. Which makes a hell of a lot more sense in context than “sic.” (Which, being an abbreviation, isn’t something you would say out loud anyway.) FWIW: Google hits for “with you but your soul think”: 98 For “with you but your soul sic” (with or without brackets): 0 ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/42 "2006-07-31T22:37:26Z")
There is no way to make “th” that prominent in a mix, and there is no “n” sound anywhere in the word. When the word “think” is pronounced “ssssic!”, then I’ll agree with you. Until then, I must cite logic and precedent as my argument. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/43 "2006-07-31T22:53:11Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] There is no way to make “th” that prominent in a mix, and there is no “n” sound anywhere in the word. When the word “think” is pronounced “ssssic!”, then I’ll agree with you. Until then, I must cite logic and precedent as my argument. [/QUOTE] I think logic and precedent are both against you in this one. “Sic” makes very little sense in the context of that lyric, and every other source, some of them authoritative, says the lyric is “think.” ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/44 "2006-07-31T22:56:00Z")
I have indicated what [sic] is used for. It makes all kinds of sense in that context. He quoted his wife, who mangled the language. It’s been 37 years and I am _still_ waiting for someone to offer any kind of sensical reason why he might have said “think.” So far, nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/45 "2006-07-31T22:58:49Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] You have to ask yourself: has anyone ever, _ever_ said “Think!” at the end of a sentence? [/quote] Yes. Quite frequently. A hell of a lot more often than I hear ‘sic’ at the end of a sentence - especially one the speaker agrees with. > [@](#): > > Does it make even a grain of sense to say “Think!” at the end of a sentence? Yes. Perfect sense. It’s an instruction ‘think about what I just said’. > [@](#): > > Can you think of why he would have done so? Yes. Two reasons, in fact. First, because he considers the line self-evident once you think about it. (Which it is. While John might have denied you have a soul to take with you, it’s pretty clear that you don’t get to take anything else!) And because he wants people to think about the concept, and realise the logical consequences - you can’t take it with you, so there’s no harm in spreading it around to the people that need it. ‘Sic’, however, a) does not make any sense whatsoever in this context, and b) as Biffy said, isn’t something that you would say aloud. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/46 "2006-07-31T23:05:45Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] He quoted his wife, who mangled the language. [/QUOTE] Nonsense. It’s not the most elegant grammar ever, but it’s neither mangled, nor outside John (or Paul’s, or George’s, or Ringo’s) spoken idiom, or the grammar that they’ve used in their other songs. It is, in fact, unlikely to be a direct quote from Yoko, at all. It’s an error made by a native English speaker - particularly one from a working class background, like John and Paul - not an error made by a Japanese speaker learning English. ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/47 "2006-07-31T23:10:11Z")
This is what this topic devolves into in every forum where I have ever seen it discussed. There is clearly no “n” sound in his exclamation. How anyone is hearing one there is beyond my ken. I am not the first person to have brought this up. Everywhere I have ever seen it discussed, it comes down to an impasse between people who refuse to accept any other possibility than the one they “know” is right, and then it devolves further into personal insults. Therefore, we are going to agree to disagree, and I will relinquish this thread to the owner and the original topic. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/48 "2006-07-31T23:25:59Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > On the Who’s original album version of Tommy, the song “We’re Not Gonna Take It” has the lines > > Hey you smoking Mother Nature > You missed the bus! > > That was a lot better than the movie version of this song, where the camera cuts to a closeup of Roger Daltrey saying, half-jokingly, > > This is a bust! (I was hoping you’d talk about _Tommy_ here, as I wrote a long final paper for a rock history class on that album, which delved deeply into this very topic.) Actually, that’s no joke; “This is a bust” was the original line on the album. Trust me. Go listen to it again. That’s actually an anti-authority message; the teen rebellion (“We’re not gonna take it!”) was in response to Tommy’s heavy-handed rules society, one of the inflammatory parts of which was his insistence on abstinence from alcohol and drugs. (Notice the lines before the dope part: “Hey you gettin’ drunk, so sorry…”) Tommy was the bad guy in that song because he’d come full circle to become nearly as oppressive as his abusive family and the society that didn’t understand him, although it can be argued that Townshend was also not a big fan of the teenagers, who rejected spirituality in favor of creature comforts. (This is a major theme of the album; other great examples of people willfully ignoring a greater understanding/truth in favor of temporary satisfaction or convenience include “1921”, “Christmas” and “Sally Simpson”.) A great example of a good anti-drug message on the same album, though, is _The Acid Queen_. Although Spiro Agnew cited it as an example of the music industry encouraging drug use, Pete Townshend has said that it was in his mind very anti-drug; anti-LSD in particular. The context of the album is that Townshend was experimenting with spirituality at the time while simultaneously rejecting LSD. The Acid Queen was the embodiment of Townshend’s frustration at what he saw as a bunch of spiritual posers trying to take a quick and easy route to faux enlightenment through LSD rather than working hard towards true self-understanding like Townshend did. (IIRC Tommy is dedicated to “Avatar”, or Meher Baba, Townshend’s spiritual role model at the time. Baba O’Reilly (the “teenage wasteland” song) was less formally dedicated to Meher Baba as well, and the background music of the song was made by feeding the biographical details of Baba’s life into a synthesizer.) As far as the drugs go, Townshend himself was a fan of marijuana and later (for two years in the 80s) cocaine. He was either strictly weed-only or drug-free during the 60s (more likely the former, although I really don’t know for sure). Keith Moon was of course a whole 'nother story. Roger Daltrey was truly _angry_ at drugs and famously caused massive tension at one point by flushing Moon’s pills down the toilet during a tour. IIRC that one resulted in a physical altercation. Things between Moon and Daltrey were always a little tense because Moon liked drugs so much and Daltrey hated them so much. (Saddest part is that Moon died on an accidental overdose of a prescription that was supposed to help him kick his alcohol habit, and I think he’d already kicked the drugs by that point.) John Entwistle was always a cocaine lover and died of cocaine-related heart problems on tour in 2002. That only heightened Pete Townshend’s guilt over his former cocaine addiction, and Pete’s had times where he’s given Daltrey the reins over the group because he was embarrassed about it. This was all off the top of my head so I may have messed up some biographical details. > [@don't ask](#): > > You know I smoked a lot of grass. > Oh Lord! I popped a lot of pills. > But I’ve never touched nothin’ > That my spirit couldn’t kill. > [@Smitty](#): > > “A million magic crystals > Painted pure and white. > A multi-million dollars > Almost overnight.” > [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > We take all kinds of pills to get all kinds of thrills > But the thrill that we’ve never known > Is the thrill that will hitcha when you get your picture > On the cover of the Rolling Stone How are these lyrics anti-drug? I’m not saying I don’t believe you, I just don’t understand that interpretation. ---
**Author:** ![Salt\_Seller](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@Salt\_Seller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salt_Seller)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/49 "2006-07-31T23:37:14Z")
All of these pale in comparison to the Birthday Party’s _Mutiny In Heaven_. _Well I jumped! and fled this fucking heap on doctored wings My flailing pinions, with splints and rags and crutches! (Damn things nearly hardly flap) Canker upon canker upon one million tiny punctures That look like… Long thin red ribbons draped across the arms of a li’l mortal girl (Like a ground-plan of Hell) Curse these smartin’ strings! These fucking ruptures! Enough! Enough is enough! (If this is Heaven I’m bailing out)_ Nick Cave then went on to spend ten more years as a heroin addict. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/50 "2006-07-31T23:46:57Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] How are these lyrics anti-drug? I’m not saying I don’t believe you, I just don’t understand that interpretation. [/QUOTE] The first one (The Pusher) isn’t so much anti-Drug in general, but it’s certainly against a certain class of drugs - I don’t know just which poisons the writer (Hoyt Axton) was particularly against, but the lyrics include > [@](#): > > You know the dealer, the dealer is a man > With the love grass in his hand > Oh but the pusher is a monster > Good God, he’s not a natural man > The dealer for a nickel > Lord, will sell you lots of sweet dreams > Ah, but the pusher ruin your body > Lord, he’ll leave your, he’ll leave your mind to scream So, while he might not have anything against pot, or certain pill-form drugs, other drugs he thought were bad things, and the people who pushed them were downright evil. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/51 "2006-08-01T00:21:17Z")
**Sam Stone** by _John Prine_: - Sam Stone was alone When he popped his last balloon Climbing walls while sitting in a chair Well, he played his last request While the room smelled just like death With an overdose hovering in the air But life had lost its fun And there was nothing to be done But trade his house that he bought on the G. I. Bill For a flag draped casket on a local heroes’ hill. There’s a hole in Daddy’s arm where all the money goes, And Jesus Christ died for nothing I suppose Little pitchers have big ears Don’t stop to count the years Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios \* Saddest.Song.Ever How about **Cocaine** by _Jackson Browne_: - I was talking to my doctor down at the hospital He said, son, it says here youre twenty-seven, But thats impossible Cocaine-- you look like you could be forty-five Now Im losing touch with reality and Im almost out of blow Its such a fine line-- I hate to see it go Cocaine, runnin all round my brain \* ---
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/52 "2006-08-01T00:30:06Z")
[QUOTE=Ellis Dee] Heroin by Lou Reed [/QUOTE] Umm… I don’t see anything anti-drug in those lyrics at all. I wouldn’t say it’s pro-heroin, either, it’s just another dramatic monologue. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/53 "2006-08-01T00:58:20Z")
[QUOTE=Tengu] The first one (The Pusher) isn’t so much anti-Drug in general, but it’s certainly against a certain class of drugs - I don’t know just which poisons the writer (Hoyt Axton) was particularly against, but the lyrics include So, while he might not have anything against pot, or certain pill-form drugs, other drugs he thought were bad things, and the people who pushed them were downright evil. [/QUOTE] Given that this guy seemed to be a 60s man, and that the song was covered by Steppenwolf in 1969, I’d wager he’s pro-grass, anti-everything-else. > [@Hoyt Axton](#): > > Good God, he’s not a natural man IME, a lot of stoners who have no desire to try other drugs call themselves “natural only”, based on the unscientific notion that cannabis (and sometimes magic mushrooms) alone is/are “natural” and everything else is “unnatural”. The same people will happily pop bottlefuls of Tylenol when they have a hangover, though. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/54 "2006-08-01T03:08:46Z")
“It’s organic, dude!” ---
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/55 "2006-08-01T03:25:32Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] Given that this guy seemed to be a 60s man, and that the song was covered by Steppenwolf in 1969, I’d wager he’s pro-grass, anti-everything-else. IME, a lot of stoners who have no desire to try other drugs call themselves “natural only”, based on the unscientific notion that cannabis (and sometimes magic mushrooms) alone is/are “natural” and everything else is “unnatural”. The same people will happily pop bottlefuls of Tylenol when they have a hangover, though. :rolleyes: [/QUOTE] I’ve met people like this. It’s more of a hierarchy: cannabis/psilocybin/peyote/ /ginger hashish/ /tums mescaline/beer/wine/ /aspirin liquor/cocaine/heroin/ /tylenol It’s something like that, anyway ---
**Author:** ![feppytweed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/feppytweed/32/4280_2.png) [@feppytweed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/feppytweed)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/56 "2006-08-01T03:31:08Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] I have indicated what [sic] is used for. It makes all kinds of sense in that context. He quoted his wife, who mangled the language. It’s been 37 years and I am still waiting for someone to offer any kind of sensical reason why he might have said “think.” So far, nothing. [/QUOTE] I completely agree. The song had poor grammar at this point, and John Lennon did not want it to seem that he was ignorant or used poor speech. That is what the word sic is for- to indicate an intentional “error”. -feppytweed, who knows that fishbicycle knows his/her stuff when it comes to The Beatles. ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/57 "2006-08-01T03:45:47Z")
Psst…thanks, but I was hoping this discussion would cease and not wreck the thread any further. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/58 "2006-08-01T04:44:29Z")
I gotta go with Jonathan Richman/The Modern Lovers and “I’m Straight”: > [@](#): > > Now I’ve watched you walk around here. > I’ve watched you meet these > boyfriends, I know, and you tell me how they’re deep. > Look but, if these guys, if they’re really so great, > tell me, why can’t they at least take this place > and take it straight? Why always stoned, > like hippie Johnny is? > I’m straight and I want to take his place. > Oh I’m certainly not stoned, like hippie Johnny is. > I’m straight and I want to take his place. > I said, I’m straight > I said, I’m straight ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/59 "2006-08-01T04:54:39Z")
_Sic_ is not an abbreviation, it’s a whole word in Latin. It means ‘thus’. I ought to know this, living in Virginia: _Sic semper tyrannis_. I hear “think” there, and IIRC Lennon commented on why he said “think” at the end of the bridge in one of his interviews, I think it was published in \*Lennon Remembers: The \*Rolling Stone _Interviews_. It was to get people to think about the line he’d just sung. He also interrupted the song rhythmically, making the word stand out more, changed the meter from 4/4 into 2/4 for just one bar with a drum fill, and then went back to the verse. I bet that was done with one or maybe two tape splices, maybe it was just meant to edit two different takes together, maybe also because he liked to startle the listeners with something unexpected. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712/60 "2006-08-01T05:13:14Z")
[QUOTE=fishbicycle] I have indicated what [sic] is used for. It makes all kinds of sense in that context. He quoted his wife, who mangled the language. It’s been 37 years and I am _still_ waiting for someone to offer any kind of sensical reason why he might have said “think.” So far, nothing. [/QUOTE] I never paid any attention to the words of this song before, but upon relistening, I don’t hear “sic.” In fact, I really can’t make out any word, but “think” is at least plausible. Who uses “sic” in conversation or song? “Think” is much more plausable and sensical than “sic” in spoken language. And what’s the “sic” for anyway? A double negative? C’mon. Who marks that with a “sic,” anyway? Certainly John Lennon wouldn’t, and even I wouldn’t if quoting someone. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-anti-drug-message-in-rock/366712.md?page=4)