The world of rock is full of stories about excesses, which is why great musicians have made many songs about drugs that we liked to listen to. An addiction is any negative habit that involves dangerous behaviors and abuse of substances that are harmful to health, which create psychological and physical dependence, making it difficult to quit. Due to the narcissistic lifestyle of rockstars, it is very easy to fall into the downward spiral of addiction and, at the same time, form a shell around it and think that everything is fine.
Drug songs and rock and roll. A beautiful love story that they have written. At least in their songs and lyrics. It is not our intention to praise drugs, nothing is further from the truth. But it is undeniable that many artists have managed to build beautiful compositions of their relationships with drugs. Their worst moments, those in which they hit rock bottom, inspired them to do great songs. Here’s an example, with these 5 Classic Rock Songs That Details The Drug Addicted Life:
The Needle And The Damage Done – Neil Young
Neil Young wrote this song in 1972 for his famous album Harvest, which, although it was never released as a single, ended up being a very popular song today but not as popular as other songs on the album such as Heart of gold and Old man. He dedicated it to his great friend and Crazy Horse partner, guitarist Danny Whitten, who in those days was in the grip of heroin. The lyrics are heartbreaking, the damage is irreversible.
Purple Haze – Jimi Hendrix
This one goes on that list of songs about drugs that go into the school of “they go about drugs, yes, but hey, they are ambiguous.” Come on, yes but no. According to Jimi Hendrix, Purple Haze is a love song (probably love for the narcotics). According to many fans and critics, the song is a clear allegory of a good stone. That haze in the brain, that fooling around without knowing why, that not knowing if you are coming or going.
Heroin – The Velvet Underground
The name of the song says it all. The Velvet Underground was not a group that fool around and in Heroin they make it clear what they are talking about. Interestingly, this is not a hymn to the beauty of the heroine. Lou Reed made a neutral approach, as happened in other of his songs for the New York group. There was no clear praise, no criticism. Maybe that gives extra beauty to the song. Perhaps it is that subtlety with which it passes in its beginnings, that gradual crescendo.
White Rabbit – Jefferson Airplane
We all know Alice in Wonderland, right? Well, in this song Grace Slick, singer of Jefferson Airplane, gives it a new meaning. Or a new vision. She does a brief review of the tale, in a song composed after an acid trip. What Slick was trying to explain is that human beings must explore their curiosity, in this case with the help of drugs. An idea very followed in the United States during the 60s.
Cold Turkey – John Lennon
The John Lennon we knew was addicted to heroin is nothing new. He lived and suffered a major addiction in the late 1960s and early 1970s. His way of attacking addiction was as simple as the world is old: stop using overnight. Known as ‘Cold Turkey’, this is what the Liverpool artist tells us about in what was one of his first solo songs.