Drugs and Creativity

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Caitrin
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 07:11 PM

Well, as Roger mentioned, drugs and alcohol tend to be rather rough on the voice. That makes them a pretty bad idea for anyone who wants to sing right off.
I haven't noticed that drugs tend to enhance anyone's creativity, either. Like others have noted, people on drugs seem to have a lot going on in their heads, but can't do much with it. Certainly, there are lots of artists who have been on various substances and produced wonderful work. Creative people will be creative; drugs will not stop them from being so, though they might inhibit said persons' ability to process their creativity. Drugs will also not make un-creative people creative.

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: JedMarum
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 07:05 PM

There is no better way to interact with your Muse than sober! Reefer is the worst drug for performance. I loved Bonny Rait's story about seeing Stevie Ray Vaughn perform his first show after sobering up. She said he was so awesome he burned a hole in the sun ... then she knew she had no more excuse, and sobdered up herself.

I think when we're young we may be more tollerant of drugs, and they affect our performance less, and we may want to believe that it enhances the experience ... but as we mature and as we become better performers we realize that they hurt.

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: clare s
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 06:55 PM

Having said that, the Beatles greatest music was made during the time that they had a far more than healthy chemical intake.

Having said that, none of us is John Lennon or Paul McCartney and the thought that we would suddenly become better musicians or songwriters simply through chemical assistance is... well make up your own mind

Clare

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 06:38 PM

Let's see how long I stand on this soap box. I feel a ton of words coming. Different drugs have different effects.

Alcohol: The first part of the brain that alcohol puts to sleep is that part that helps us form our judgment. You know, some people think they drive better with a few drinks in them. Well, drinkers are not good judges. Eventually, enough alcohol puts your motor skills to sleep, a little at a time. Two favorites of mine, John Prine and Warren Zevon had a drinking problem in my judgment (I think Warren admits to it, I've never heard John speak about it). I believe they both are recovering. I don't see any loss in creativity. Alcohol is hard on the vocal cords.

Marijuana: Again a drug that quickly affects judgment. Putting judgment to sleep may, at first, free us up to try things we would not have tried before (like chatting up a certain woman), because we have less fear. Smoking, in general, is hard on the throat and the lungs.

LSD: Timothy Leary says you will have insights you would not have had before. That may be. Of course, you might have insights that aren't worth a dime. A rather risky drug as well.

Heroin: There goes the old judgment center again. Too much puts you to sleep. Regular use usually leads to addiction and any benefits there might be go down the tubes.

Cocaine: May make you feel bright and charming and creative, but your sober peers may feel you are just "off the wall." Another drug with high risk for addiction.

So, a little drug might boost your creativity because you are suspending judgment and you try new things. Unfortunately, while under the influence you can't determine which new things are good and which new things are bad.

Try meditation. It yields insight with fewer risks.

Roger in Baltimore (yeah, that damn Addiction Counselor. Jeez, what a wet blanket!)

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: sophocleese
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:56 PM

I liked clare s' rule of thumb. I know that if I drink a little I relax a little and experiment more with music and harmony but that I also sing really, really sharp. If I'm performing I don't drink at all before I sing because I know that although when I'm drunk I think I sound better, I actually sound better when I'm sober. There was a book that came out about ten years ago (I cannot remember the title or author and its driving me nuts!!) which explored the different devices various authors composers artists etc. had used to promote their creativity. The one that sticks in my mind is an author who had a barrel of rotting apples under his desk. He would lift the lid and take a sniff and get back to writing. I wonder if that would become a backstage option at concerts?

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Bert
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:42 PM

I like a beer or two (or three). It doesn't help my music AT ALL, but It feels good. Weed just zonks me out and I find the loss of control a little unnerving, so I don't use it.

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Max
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:35 PM

On of my favorite rock guitarists, yes rock, was on drugs for quite a while and is now clean said it best. He explained that when he was hopped up on drugs playing solos and whatnot they sounded amazing. When he would listen to the tracks sober, they were awful.

The key seems to be that the audience needs to be on drugs, not the musician, which would explain the Grateful Dead phenomenon. I do prefer to be onstage later in the night, when folks have a few drinks in them, and would be thrilled if they were smoked too.

I find it almost always degrading to my technique to have any alchohol in me at all. Makes sense for the same reasons we don't drink and drive. Refelexes etc. Weed on the other hand does not effect ones reflexes, and may serve to fascilitate a focus or concentration on your Art. Zone in on the notes, or perhaps fear less the chances you might take with your solo or range. Jon is right though, you may lose the ability to count or feel the measure and hit the turn arounds or play well with others. But I am a solo musician. If I were a part of a band, I would absolutely not consider smoking.

I want to believe that weed helps. Point is, we don't know for sure. Performing and just playing is a tremendous source of hapiness for me. If weed makes me enjoy it more and makes me think I sound better, I say OK. But you know that if you think you need it to perform, you might get trapped into really needing it.

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:30 PM

I hate playing with people who have been smoking weed. The ones I have met seem to think that they play better for it and they may well enjoy themselves but I have found that they just end up playing nonsense and think that they are being inspirational.

I have tried it on a couple of occasions and found that I just coudn't focus on my timing or anything. Having said that, I don't like it anyway as it tends to bring on some form of paranoia with me - I usually just feel really ill and want to hide in a corner and die.

Jon

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Wesley S
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:12 PM

From my experience drugs work for awhile. But eventually they tend { for me } to have an opposite effect. I want to be creative/I zone out , I want to be more sociable / I become a loner. I want insight/I become a zombie. And so on. They make me very boring.

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: InOBU
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:11 PM

When I was in high school - Music and Art, in New York in the many decades ago... I noticed that there was a lot of creativity going on in the heads of guys who smoked alot of weed, and very little of it found its way onto the canvas. There were exeptions, but, art seems to happen when there is some irritation to scratch, when every thing is cool... why get up and paint, sing etc, and if you look at great times of artistic expression, it is generally a generation challenged to greatness, not a fat and comfortable generation. But, as I say this, one of my favorite contempory painters, who lived accross the hall from me in the 70s, to quote an old lawyer friend, was never known to draw a sober breath, and one could get a contact high standing outside his door.
I - myself, dont have the money or engery to get high. Too much else to do first.
Larry

Subject: RE: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: clare s
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 05:05 PM

As a simple rule of thumb I'd suggest that 'chemically assisted' music is great when under the influence, and music written straight is best listened to straight.

Clare

Subject: Drugs and ''Creativity''
From: Mandy
Date: 11 Jan 00 - 04:50 PM

I would be very interested in the views of Mudcatters regarding the myths and realities of the subject line of this thread.

Some of the greatest ''innovators'' in music have been junkies and other substance abusers. Was their creative spirit there, before the drugs?.....and did the drugs stimulate this creativity?.......or was the drug use an escape or manifestation as a result of intense personal problems of these creators?

My personal experiences have been that when I was young (middle aged now) and performing with bands, many of us would smoke a little weed before going on stage.

We found it gave us a little extra zip, in performing and made it more enjoyable....but, understand that we had our musical arrangements down cold, to the point where we could play them in any condition. Where it became fun was in soloing or improvising. Course there were occasional gigs that we taped, (performing under the influence) where we thought we had blown screaming solos, only to play them back later and discover that they made no musical sense whatsoever.

As far as song writing, the problem I have always found, is that you can get a great whirlwind of inspiration for songs, but by the time you go to lay down the ideas, the ideas are gone.

As I am now older and hopefully a bit wiser, I don't mix my recreational toking (still confined to the ''evil'' weed, and I don't drink) with my music. I like to be totally focussed on what I'm doing without any extraneous enhancements.