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Post by xpt626 on Jun 2, 2004 14:01:06 GMT -5
McCartney Dishes on Drug Past
Wednesday, June 02, 2004
Associated Press story
LONDON — Paul McCartney says he got no thrill from heroin, but found cocaine more to his liking for a time.
"I tried heroin just the once," McCartney said in interview published Wednesday in the Daily Mirror newspaper about his drug use in decades past.
"Even then, I didn't realize I'd taken it. I was just handed something, smoked it, then found out what it was.
"It didn't do anything for me, which was lucky because I wouldn't have fancied heading down that road," the former Beatle was quoted as saying. The full interview is published this week in Uncut magazine.
McCartney's drug use has resulted in at least one brush with the law. A planned Japan tour in 1980 was derailed when the singer was arrested at Tokyo's airport for possession of marijuana and later deported.
Despite enjoying cocaine for a time, he said he eventually turned against the drug.
"I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sgt. Pepper," he said, referring to The Beatles' 1967 album.
"Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine.
"I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed OK, like anything that's new and stimulating.
"When you start working your way through it, you start thinking: 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea,' especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns," McCartney said. He confirmed that drugs influenced some of the group's songs.
"A song like 'Got to Get You Into My Life,' that's directly about pot, although everyone missed it at the time," McCartney said.
"'Day Tripper,' that's one about acid (LSD). 'Lucy in the Sky', that's pretty obvious. There's others that make subtle hints about drugs, but, you know, it's easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles' music."
"Just about everyone was doing drugs in one form or another and we were no different, but the writing was too important for us to mess it up by getting off our heads all the time," McCartney added.
McCartney also acknowledged that Wings, the band he formed after The Beatles' breakup, was "pretty rough, not terribly good" when it started out.
"There was a time when The Beatles weren't very good, but we were able to be not very good in private," McCartney said.
"Wings had to do it in public and there was always the shadow of The Beatles, which didn't help."
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Post by eyesbleed on Jun 2, 2004 15:26:23 GMT -5
McCartney Dishes on Drug Past"'Day Tripper,' that's one about acid (LSD). 'Lucy in the Sky', that's pretty obvious. There's others that make subtle hints about drugs, but, you know, it's easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles' music." [/i][/quote] Day Tripper about LSD??? I don't think so..... what a bunch of bull****! I don't see how ya could spin those lyrics to be about LSD... it seems obvious that it's about a hooker. There's nothing in those lyrics to vaguely imply an LSD trip. 'She's a big teaser, she took me half the way there??? LSD in the 60's-mid 70's certainly wasn't a tease & it got you all the way there.....every time!! Besides.... they weren't doing psychedelics yet when Day Tripper came out anyway. What an idiotic thing to say about a Beatles song lyric. |
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Post by SimMHoward on Jun 2, 2004 15:34:51 GMT -5
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Post by JoJo on Jun 2, 2004 17:34:41 GMT -5
Uh well he seems to have forgotten the numerous times that John said that "Lucy" was inspired by a drawing done by Julian. What's next, he'll forget what prompted him to write "Hey Jude"?
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Post by SimMHoward on Jun 2, 2004 18:05:53 GMT -5
actually, if you can find the entire article online, it touchs on that, the one posted isn't complete and I can't find a link to the complete one I found
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Post by xpt626 on Jun 2, 2004 19:00:31 GMT -5
....the one posted isn't complete ..... it is complete as I found it, from the Associated Press. Perhaps the actual London Daily Mirror article is more detailed, and longer.... |
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Post by eyesbleed on Jun 2, 2004 19:52:05 GMT -5
Thanks.... 1965, wow that's kinda early to be discovering acid. I didn't realize that happened in 65. The more I think about it, the more idiotic that statement seems. I suppose he pulled Day TRIPPER out of thin air simply because of the title.(?) Got a good reason for taking the easy way out Got a good reason for taking the easy way out now She was a day tripper One way ticket, yeah It took me so long to find out and I found out She's a big teaser She took me half the way there She's a big teaser She took me half the way there, now She was a day tripper One way ticket, yeah It took me so long to find out and I found out Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah Tried to please her She only played one night stand Tried to please her She only played one night stand, now She was a day tripper One way ticket, yeah It took me so long to find out and I found out Day tripper, day tripper, yeah |
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Post by DarkHorse on Jun 2, 2004 20:04:08 GMT -5
I am not sure about Day Tripper but I believe Lennon's statements that Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was based on a drawing by Julian, not about LSD. Ringo confirmed this in an interview and said he's even seen the drawing.
BTW, Faul is certainly a tool.
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Post by xpt626 on Jun 2, 2004 21:09:53 GMT -5
OK, cut-and-paste from The Daily Mirror's website:
By Jon Wilde Adapted By David Edwards
AT THE very height of Beatlemania, the Fab Four played to an astonishing 500,000 people during a 1964 whirlwind tour of the US.
Today, 40 years on, Sir Paul McCartney will be seen by more than 700,000 fans in a 13-date European tour. Not bad for a man who turns 62 this month.
But even though he is in numerical terms a bigger draw than the Beatles ever were, he is not about to play down the debt he owes to his years in the biggest pop group of all time.
In his most revealing interview ever, McCartney has talked candidly about his love for John Lennon, the nervous breakdown he suffered after the Beatles split and why he should never have released some of his solo albums.
Although it's well known that he dabbled with drugs, including cannabis and cocaine, he reveals for the first time how he once took heroin.
His verdict: "It didn't do anything for me, which was lucky because I wouldn't have fancied heading down that road."
McCartney, who is due to headline the Glastonbury Festival on June 26, says: "What's amazed me about the big tours I've done in the last few years is that the thrill is as great as it ever was.
"We go on tour now and I think I should be fed up with it all by now - after all, I've done a fair bit of it. But I go to places like Mexico City and I get an audience that's louder than any I've ever heard, including those at Beatles gigs.
"I'm singing Hello Goodbye and the way they react is so completely overwhelming that I can barely get the words out."
But he knows that the songs he and John Lennon wrote together will get the biggest cheers of all.
"There are days when I wake up and have to remind myself that I wrote songs with John Lennon," he says.
"It's fantastic that he was a part of my life in that way.
IMAGINE the luxury of being stuck on a song and being able to hand it over to John Lennon to finish off. Do I miss that? Of course I do. Hugely.
"In all the years I wrote with John, I can't remember a single occasion when we didn't come up with a song.
"At worst, we'd write at least once every day. It all happened at an amazing pace.
"We'd sag off school and write songs at my house. We'd start at two in the afternoon and we had to be finished by five so we could clean up and clear out before my dad got home.
"We wrote loads of stuff. We'd stuff some Twinings tea in a pipe, smoke that and write songs. It wasn't all good but we always came up with something.
"We all had a common vision, at least in the early days. The thing about me and John is that we were different - but we weren't that different.
"I think Linda put her finger on it when she said me and John were like mirror images of each other.
"Even down to how we started writing together, facing each other, eyeball-to-eyeball, exactly like looking in the mirror.
"On the surface, I was very easy-going, always accommodating, but, at certain times, I would very much be the hard man of the duo.
"John would allow me to take that role because it enabled him to drop his guard and be vulnerable.
"On the surface, he was this hard, witty guy, always on hand with a cutting witticism. He appeared caustic, even cruel at times, but really he was very soft.
"John was very insecure. He carried a lot of that from his upbringing, what with his father leaving when he was five.
"Then, of course, we'd both lost our mothers, so we had that in common. Ultimately, we were equals."
After releasing their debut album in 1963, the Beatles - Lennon, McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr - went on to become the biggest names in pop.
By the time they split up in 1970,they had released some of the most innovative, groundbreaking albums ever, including Rubber Soul, Revolver and Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. In the early days one of their biggest influences was Elvis Presley, but as the King's career faltered in the 60s drugs became another inspiration.
"The army had kind of ruined Elvis," says Paul. "He'd been this ultimate rebel figure who we'd all worshipped.
"Then they made him cut his hair and he had to call everyone 'sir', and he was never really the same again.
"Just about everyone was doing drugs in one form or another and we were no different, but the writing was too important for us to mess it up by getting off our heads all the time. It was just easier to write when we were straight and seemly.
"It was only on Pepper that we started to use stuff in the studio. On the earlier albums we'd have been using those drugs socially, so in that sense the drugs informed what we did.
"A song like Got To Get You Into My Life, that's directly about pot, although everyone missed it at the time. Day Tripper, that's one about acid. Lucy In The Sky, that's pretty obvious.
"There's others that make subtle hints about drugs, but, you know, it's easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles' music.
"I tried heroin just the once. Even then, I didn't realise I'd taken it. I was just handed something, smoked it, then found out what it was.
"It didn't do anything for me, which was lucky because I wouldn't have fancied heading down that road.
"I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sergeant Pepper. Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine.
"I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed OK, like anything that's new and stimulating.
"When you start working your way through it, you start thinking: 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea', especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns."
Perhaps the biggest comedown of all came as the group imploded at the end of the 60s when McCartney sued the other Beatles to dissolve the band.
"It was 10 years of hell," he says. "What followed was that everyone was split into camps.
"There were three of them and one of me. John, George and Ringo had been my best mates.
"Now they were my enemies. That was really, really hard to take.
"In the Beatles, we'd always had this running joke: 'What are we going to do when the bubble bursts?'
"Then it did burst and I went up to my farm in Scotland, wondering what the hell I was going to do next.
"I seriously thought about giving up music altogether. It was a bloody hard time.
"It was difficult to get up in the morning. I was drinking quite a lot, probably having a bit of a nervous breakdown. Looking back, I was in a state of grief. I realise that now. Grief for the end of the Beatles."
It was only through music that he was able to rouse himself from his torpor. In 1971 he founded Wings with his first wife Linda, Denny Laine and Denny Seiwell.
Although the band sold millions of records, it never received anything like the critical acclaim lavished upon the Beatles.
"Early Wings were pretty rough, not terribly good," admits Paul. "There was a time when the Beatles weren't very good, but we were able to be not very good in private.
"Wings had to do it in public and there was always the shadow of the Beatles, which didn't help.
"One thing you have to say is that I've put out an awful lot of records. Some of them I shouldn't have put out, sure. I'd gladly accept that.
"There's many different reasons for putting a record out. Sometimes I might just put one out because I'm bored and I've got nothing better to do.
"In 1977, I fancied doing a Scottish bagpipe song, so I wrote Mull Of Kintyre. The people who hated it were p****d off with me.
"Of course, it didn't help that it came out at the height of punk rock. But what should I have done at that time? Stuck a safety pin through my nose and done some bonkers punk song?
MY attitude is really: 'Sod you. You think Mull Of Kintyre is crap - you try writing something like that.' I do get annoyed at having to justify myself.
"Since school, I've never liked having to do that. I never liked anyone telling me what to do. I never liked that bullying tendency."
Wings split up in 1980 - the year McCartney was arrested at Tokyo International Airport after marijuana was found in his luggage.
He remembers: "I was out in New York and I had all this really good grass. Excellent stuff.
"We were about to fly to Japan and I knew I wouldn't be able to get anything to smoke over there. This stuff was too good to flush down the toilet, so I thought I'd take it with me.
"Looking back, it's not too wonderful being banged up in a Japanese jail.
"When I first arrived I was thinking: 'This is a storm in a teacup - I'll be out in no time.' Then the British vice-consul told me I could get seven years of hard labour. That's when it got extremely worrying.
"It was five days before Linda was allowed to visit me and I'd never spent a night apart from her since we'd married. It was pretty rough. Just a thin mattress on the floor.
"I had to wash myself using water from the toilet cistern. I had to share a bath with a bloke who was in for murder. I was afraid to take my suit off in case I got raped."
Twenty-four years on, possessing pot doesn't seem quite the heinous offence it once was. McCartney says: "Just the other day I went for a walk on my own in the Hollywood Hills.
"This bunch of teenagers passed by me and one of them turned to me and said: 'Hey, Macca, you're the man! Fancy joining us for a smoke?'
"To me, it's a huge compliment that a bunch of kids think I might be up to smoke a bit of dope with them.
"I'd be mad not to feel blessed, wouldn't I? I've been a lucky bugger and so many things that happened to me were pure chance.
"I'm lucky, very f*****g lucky, just to still be vibing and loving life and holding on to my enthusiasm for things."
For the full interview, check out this month's Uncut - the music and movies magazine, on sale from tomorrow.
Uncut/IPC Syndication
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Post by eyesbleed on Jun 2, 2004 21:37:03 GMT -5
I am not sure about Day Tripper but I believe Lennon's statements that Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was based on a drawing by Julian, not about LSD. Ringo confirmed this in an interview and said he's even seen the drawing. BTW, Faul is certainly a tool. It's a little infuriating that he'd be making these off-the-cuff remarks interpretting stuff that he had nothing to do with in the first place. There was also a small article in my morning paper today about his show in Spain. It said something about his speaking in spanish to the audience & a quote of him saying...."Ya I was taught spanish for a year; 50yrs ago when I was 11 at school in Liverpool." HUH??? Well that magnificent brain of his certainly retains stuff better than mine... if that were the case! |
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Post by JoJo on Jun 3, 2004 16:25:27 GMT -5
He may have the part about Day tripper right, from the Lennon 1970 Rolling Stone interview: I remember this single coming out, "Day Tripper-/We Can Work It Out."
Yeah, that was a drug song.
"Day Tripper"?
Um.
Why?
Cause it was a day tripper. I just liked the word.
Btw, if anyone wants to read that interview, check out this thread: invanddis.proboards29.com/index.cgi?board=john&action=display&thread=1080964045 |
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Post by eyesbleed on Jun 3, 2004 17:02:18 GMT -5
Cause it was a day tripper. I just liked the word. The song title is the only trippy thing about that song. After doin' acid in the 60's, I never once came down thinkin'... .....well THAT only took me half the way there! |
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Post by DarkHorse on Jun 3, 2004 20:30:02 GMT -5
The song title is the only trippy thing about that song. After doin' acid in the 60's, I never once came down thinkin'... .....well THAT only took me half the way there! You have a point there! |
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Post by southpaw on Jun 4, 2004 2:22:57 GMT -5
???strange I heard faul say the exact same thing about day tripper as lennon is quoted as saying(read JoJo's 1970 rolling stone quote)
The song doesn't have any drug refererences other than the title.
The song has certain psychedelic qualities in its production, strange panning, odd overdubs, etc.
So I'd be willing to believe they were experimenting with LSD at the time of this recording.
but it being about acid? give me a break.
And John had a history of being unreliable when it came to explaining his own lyrics
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Post by Doc on Jun 4, 2004 2:32:11 GMT -5
Well, interesting revelations. I think that is all very plausable. Growing up in 60's, 70's, drugs are everywhere. YOu get hit on to try something all the time. You say no for a long time. You try a few things. You hate some, you like some. You learn to say no to some, try to remember to say no to some others, and have no trouble saying no to the rest. My kidney stone--they gave me Dilaudid for the excruciating pain. Well, I am glad the pain was controlled, but that sensation is, they shoot you with that morphine like stuff,to me, most unpleasant. Dilaudid is strong, some kind of artificial opiate. Don't like those. So, what's the diff. The doctor gave me mine, others try it to see. I would not do that for recreation. For some, it is just no thing to want. Experimentation was common place then. Most people survived. Some couldn't.  About John............ It seems that John's most often said phrase after the "Beatles are Bigger than Jesus" misinterpretation was: "Well, what I meant was.................." Every interview, every magazine article, every TV spot, every encounter with fans, always........." "Well, what I really meant was........." A close second: "That isn't what I meant, really." or: "They've got it all wrong........." So much frustration for this man. Always having to reclarify. Profoundly interesting person. |
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Post by Girl on Oct 28, 2004 9:00:40 GMT -5
Interesting highlights from that article makes one wonder...
And to sum it all up:
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