How Much Did Brian...

[cutterschoice]

Does Brian still hear the devil talking to him and does he still see him in the showerhead?

With treatment hallucinations are minimal and the voices are not as frequent. But they're still there. The difference being that with treatment he knows they are the product of his illness. Without it, the delusions erode any grasp with reality, making it hard to distinguish which is which.

if you've taken a fairly large dose of LSD or magic mushrooms before you may have experienced times where it's hard to tell what is and what isn't real. I can't imagine how unbearable it must be to have that everyday. What a nightmare.

There's a transcript from a court case Brian was involved in several years ago where they detailed the voices he hears. one is his father, the other is Phil Spector and the third I can't recall. I will try and find that transcript again. it was interesting because in the case, the Judge was concerned with Brian's behaviour and as a result the defense listed the details of his illness.

[Peter Ames Carlin]

With all due respect to So Cold and everyone else, I think it's really a slippery slope to try to posit a logical this-because-of-that kind of narrative about the relationship between Brian's drug use and his mental illness. I agree that LSD is a powerful drug that can do wack stuff to your consciousness if you do a lot of it. But the friends/companions I spoke to who spent a lot of time with him at the height of BW's mid-to-late 60s drug moment, were unanimous in their opinions that BW barely ever took LSD. He dabbled, maybe a small handful of times, and that was it, according to everyone from Loren Schwartz to VDP to Michael Vosse and a few more folks I'm not remembering off the top of my head right now.

It's really fun and easy to blame drugs for mental illness, because it serves as such an easy way for family/friends to not come to terms with the far more ugly reality of emotional illness. But our society is particularly blind when it comes to treating the mentally ill, so I guess it's not surprising.

[Myk Luhv]

I was not blaming his mental illness on anything he did or anyone else did [to him] -- it's definitely not his fault, and he'd have depression and schizoaffective disorder whether he did drugs, or whether Murry was an butthole, or not. I was merely suggesting that he might have done less drugs if he had been properly treated in the 1960s and '70s when it became more apparent that something was wrong with him. This obviously is predicated on the idea that some of the amount of drugs he did was done out of a desire for self-medication which I don't know and could be wrong about. It is obviously very easy to say he is mentally ill because of his drug use, but I do not think that is accurate and it is also offensive (for that would be blaming the victim). I agree with you that he should have gone to a psychiatrist of some kind too so that he could get his emotional (familial/personal/etc.) problems sorted out -- hell, he could go now; it's never too late to get therapy!

[Jay]

One thing that has to be taken into account is the fact that LSD back in the 1960's was supposedly several times more powerful than it is today. I have read that the LSD of today contains only a certain amount of "pure" LSD(I'm not sure of the technical terms for the "ingredients"). and it's usually mixed with other chemicals. So even if Brian only did it once at the absolute minimum, it still could have done damage, considering his family's mental health history.

[cutterschoice]

Brian said he started hearing voices a couple of weeks after his first LSD trip. I certainly don't think LSD caused his illness, but was merely the catalyst. If you have the condition dormant it can only take one trip to set it off.

If he never touched LSD his condition still could have developed, especially given the pressures he faced.

And Jay, it's true LSD today has a much lower purity than it did in the 60s, unfortunately.

[?]

There's a transcript from a court case Brian was involved in several years ago where they detailed the voices he hears. one is his father, the other is Phil Spector and the third I can't recall.

I believe the third voice was Danny Hutton.

[b00ts]

One thing that has to be taken into account is the fact that LSD back in the 1960's was supposedly several times more powerful than it is today. I have read that the LSD of today contains only a certain amount of "pure" LSD(I'm not sure of the technical terms for the "ingredients"). and it's usually mixed with other chemicals. So even if Brian only did it once at the absolute minimum, it still could have done damage, considering his family's mental health history.

This is somewhat true - there are very few chemicals which have the potency that LSD does, the potency of which enables a strong hit to be contained on a bit of blotter paper. The only other ones with similar effects to LSD are chemical analogues like LSA, which is weaker than LSD from what I understand. However there is still powerful acid out there... so I hear from people who do that sort of thing, which I never ever would, if any law enforcement officers are reading this.

"LSD flashbacks" are a big canard in our culture. As most of you probably know by now, they are simply the same sort of flashbacks that happen to people when they've had a traumatic event, like PTSD (or shell-shock as it used to be called.) Many people still think that LSD stays in your spinal fluid for years and this can cause flashbacks. This is complete and utter bullshit. People who had bad trips tend to remember them and sometimes have flashbacks for the same reasons that people with other traumatizing experiences do.

However, in someone with a propensity for mental illness, specifically disorders along the lines of schizophrenia et. al, psychedelic drugs like LSD, Psilocybin and even Marijuana/Hash, all of which are benign when it comes to permanent physical effects*, can precipitate a nervous breakdown and exacerbation of the mental illness.

It's also worth noting that people with schizoaffective disorders and bipolar disorder, typically start to feel the effects of their disease in their late teens/early-to-mid twenties. Interestingly, patients with schizophrenia have been found to have a much easier life after the age of sixty, due to changes in brain chemistry... so if they can make it past the big 6-0, their disease becomes more manageable. Sound like someone we know?

As for the changes in Brian's voice, the immense amount of tobacco he smoked is an obvious culprit. Alcohol also hurts the vocal chords and esophagus. Cocaine is very bad for the voice as well; in George Carlin's memoir, he talks about how his doctor in the 70s told him to stop doing cocaine because it made him talk nonstop and anesthetized his vocal cords, causing him to not realize the damage he was causing to his voice. I wouldn't be surprised if amphetamines had a similar effect on Brian, causing him to talk nonstop.

When it comes to brain damage, I agree that the drugs prescribed by Landy in the late 80's likely had a momentous effect on Brian's neurological system. I don't know as much about thorazine and tricyclic antidepressants as other people here likely do, so I will defer to their expertise.

It is worth noting, however, that observers in several cases noted Brian having a nonstop tremor in one of his legs in the late 1970s/early 1980s. This is the period when he would walk around the pool constantly, smoking cigarette after cigarette. Being grotesquely overweight with a poor diet high in fat, smoking cigarettes, and doing insane amounts of amphetamines and cocaine cannot have been good for his blood pressure and circulatory system, which may have led to some brain damage, including possibly some mini-strokes (they sound cute, don't they? Well they're not...)

 * Nota bene: marijuana and LSD do not cause brain damage, except the damage from holding your breath and not breathing oxygen in the case of smoked marijuana

[rogerlancelot]

There's a transcript from a court case Brian was involved in several years ago where they detailed the voices he hears. one is his father, the other is Phil Spector and the third I can't recall.

I believe the third voice was Danny Hutton.

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[nobody is a chode]

Wait, so Brian really hears Murry, Phil, and Danny in his head?

Someone should make this into a cartoon

[Jay]

Why Danny Hutton? I can understand hearing his dad. I can even understand Phil Spector, but why Danny Hutton?

[nobody is a chode]

Why Danny Hutton? I can understand hearing his dad. I can even understand Phil Spector, but why Danny Hutton?

Maybe he hung out with him too much and assimilated his personality into his own mind.

Just imagine every time something funny happens, Danny Hutton's voice bursts out laughing in your mind...

[Mikie]

Even Lauren Schwartz laughs about it in the Brian documentary. To Schwartz, Brian's reaction to it was funny, putting a pillow over his head and later coming out of the room or whatever story it was. Schwartz, laughed about it, like it was no big deal. You know he must know Brian's condition now - has he not taken any responsibility for what the drugs supposedly did to Brian? Assuming the acid had anything to do with causing or exacerbating the problem. And Schwartz even emphasizes during his interview that Brian took undiluted acid, which was obviously stronger back in the 60's.

You can hear Brian call out for "Lauren" during the Rhonda sessions. He and later Hutton were his main connects. And maybe Sly Stone?

I dunno, growing up I always had people say, "Don't do that sh*t!", it'll fry your brain! And I took their word for it after I took it once and saw elephants fly between the tops of telephone poles.

[Jay]

You know, I'm curios to see what an x-ray of Brian's lungs looks like. My dad recently died from the long term effects of smoking. He smoked about two packs a day. Brian supposedly smoked up to five packs each day.

[Jay]

Schwartz, laughed about it, like it was no big deal. You know he must know Brian's condition now - has he not taken any responsibility for what the drugs supposedly did to Brian?

Why should he? Brian was the one that took them.

[punkinhead]

What'd coke do for him? during the 'cocaine sessions' did he really get inspired by the drug itself?

[nobody is a chode]

Everyone hates on Loren but one has to understand it in context.

To him, Brian's initial reaction to LSD probably was hilarious. Why not?

It's fun watching people break out of their minds.

Many people have so much baggage in their minds they have to throw out, like Manson teaching Dennis the dance.

I guess one can lay the blame on Loren for being Brian's Tim Leary, turning him on in that way

[Mikie]

Why should he? Brian was the one that took them.

Why should he, Jay? Well, if Loren turned Brian onto a drug that permanately f*cked him up, don't you think he should feel a little guilty about it? Just a little bit? Instead of passing it off as no big deal and thinking it's funny?

[Jay]

Why should he? Brian was the one that took them.

Why should he, Jay? Well, if Loren turned Brian onto a drug that permanately f*cked him up, don't you think he should feel a little guilty about it? Just a little bit? Instead of passing it off as no big deal and thinking it's funny?

The whole "blame everybody but Brian" thing gets old quick. Brian's a big boy. He knew what he was doing.

[Mikie]

Of course he knew what he was doing! He may not have known to what extent he was screwing his brain up at the time, but he sure loved the pot, the hash, and the coke while he was doing it!  Who cares about the after-affects while you're doing it? Addicts don't give a rats ass about that! They're thinking about where do get some more when it wears off!

To this day, Brian only blames himself for doing the drugs and acknowledges that they did damage. He ain't pointing fingers at anybody. I remember when he was asked once during an interview what he would change or do differently in his life. Without hesitation, he said, "I wish I hadn't done drugs".

[Jay]

Of course he knew what he was doing! He may not have known to what extent he was screwing his brain up at the time

NOBODY knew at the time. Not Loren, Not Danny, or Marylin, or anybody. How can you blame somebody for doing something when they themselves didn't know?

[Mikie]

That's not what is suggested above by a couple of people, Jay. They suggest that family members knew but were trying to hide it and played it down and didn't want to face it.

I asked Marilyn Wilson once about SMiLE and the main reason for it's demise.  Know what she said?  Drugs.  So obviously she knew!  And she knew at the time.  Brian himself knew one of the main reasons was hash.

[Chris Brown]

Loren does have a slightly unsettling disposition when talking about Brian's first LSD experience, but ultimately I agree with Jay here - Brian was the one who made the choice, and if it hadn't been Loren giving it to him, Brian would have found someone else.  I don't take Loren's laughter about the incident to mean that he thinks what ultimately happened to Brian was funny in any way.  If asked, knowing what he knows now, maybe Loren would regret giving the LSD to Brian.  That wasn't what he was asked though...it always seemed to me that he was laughing only about the incident itself, nothing more (i.e. the inevidable consequences).

As far as the original topic we started with, I think Mr. Carlin (and others) have it right in saying that Brian's drug use exacerbated a problem that was already lying dormant inside him just waiting for a catalyst.  Had everything gone down 40 years later than it did, Brian would have been a lot better off, just because mental illness is much more openly discussed today (not to mention better treated) than it used to be.  Melinda even said in one of Brian's documentaries that if someone today is experiencing problems like Brian had, they would shoot him up to UCLA in a heartbeat and start professional treatment.  Brian just had the unfortunate luck of being born in a time where it wasn't the norm to get somebody in his position the help they needed.  

[Mikie]

And wasn't it Murry who warned Brian about the consequences of drugs? He knew what was up. And wasn't it Jardine who knew what Brian was up to when he drove around and around the parking lot during the recording of Good Vibrations? I think I read where Al said he thought maybe that acid had really affected him at that point. They all knew, but maybe at the time they weren't aware of the long term effects....

[Ron]

You know, I'm curios to see what an x-ray of Brian's lungs looks like. My dad recently died from the long term effects of smoking. He smoked about two packs a day. Brian supposedly smoked up to five packs each day.

This may be completely bullshit... but back 'n the day when I was a youngster, in elementary school they showed us some of this stuff, and claimed that if you stop smoking, your lungs return to normal, healthy conditions in a year or two.  That's notwithstanding any disease or whatever you developed, but the people filling my little head with information showed pictures and things showing 'healthy' lungs, then 'bad smoker not healthy lungs', then 'here's those lungs after they stopped smoking' lungs.  It appeared that the lungs are slightly regenerative.  Of course if you developed lung cancer from it you're f***ed, but who knows they could have been lying about all that anways. 

[rab2591]

You know, I'm curios to see what an x-ray of Brian's lungs looks like. My dad recently died from the long term effects of smoking. He smoked about two packs a day. Brian supposedly smoked up to five packs each day.

This may be completely bullmerda... but back 'n the day when I was a youngster, in elementary school they showed us some of this stuff, and claimed that if you stop smoking, your lungs return to normal, healthy conditions in a year or two.  That's notwithstanding any disease or whatever you developed, but the people filling my little head with information showed pictures and things showing 'healthy' lungs, then 'bad smoker not healthy lungs', then 'here's those lungs after they stopped smoking' lungs.  It appeared that the lungs are slightly regenerative.  Of course if you developed lung cancer from it you're fodido, but who knows they could have been lying about all that anways. 

I think that some crap stays in your lungs - but if you cut out smoking altogether and breathe nothing but clean air, your cells will be able to repair and get back some life in them....but this is total speculation, I really have no idea what I'm talking about.