What did LSD do to BW?

[Loaf]

From what I can gather, Brian had two frightening experiences with LSD and one (half) very positive one. How long after this did he start having problems and what was it that caused them? mid-67 to 75 seems to be a murky time period (it gets little attention in his "auto"biography). From Brian's own comments about his experiences, they seem to have been positive ones overall.

It seems to me that after he gave up on Smile, and collaborated with the BBs more, he was "alright" for a year or two and then things started to go bad for him, but either no one knows, or everyone knows but me and no one is saying it.

I haven't really followed all the soap-opera aspects of the timelines etc...but wouldn't his amphetamine use in the 60s or cocaine use in the late 60s have been worse for him?

[Andrew G. Doe]

I think Brian said it best, some good few years ago: "LSD blew my mind and I came back in about a million pieces". Doesn't sound at all positive to me.

[Thunderfingers75]

I'm not sure that LSD is completely to blame. I think the fact that he was already experienceing the affects of being paranoid schitzophrenic didnt help. I'm sure the acid only worsened the symptoms.

Not to make this a drug forum or anything but was the acid of the late 60's more powerful than the acid of today? I'm not a burnout or anything but I have had a few experiences with Liquid LSD in my early 20's. It was powerful but I dont ever remember feeling completely out of control. Maybe the LSD from back then was just stronger. Maybe Brain had a connection with Owsley:) .  Any of you guys around back in the day to comment?

[buddhahat]

Doesn't sound at all positive to me.

Agreed, but I doubt he could've written Good Vibrations if he'd never taken it. Not that Brian probably gets much solace from that fact. Or maybe he does!

[Andrew G. Doe]

I'm not sure that LSD is completely to blame. I think the fact that he was already experienceing the affects of being paranoid schitzophrenic didnt help. I'm sure the acid only worsened the symptoms.

Not to make this a drug forum or anything but was the acid of the late 60's more powerful than the acid of today? I'm not a burnout or anything but I have had a few experiences with Liquid LSD in my early 20's. It was powerful but I dont ever remember feeling completely out of control. Maybe the LSD from back then was just stronger. Maybe Brain had a connection with Owsley:) .  Any of you guys around back in the day to comment?

The acid back then was whole orders of magnitude stronger - the stuff Brian took was very pure.

[Loaf]

I guess it's the timeline of what happened after, more than the effects of the drugs themselves, that I haven't fully grasped.

It's tempting to see Smiley Smile as Brian's post-LSD freakout/breakdown/retreat etc...but he was still making/planning to make fully-realised and professional music with Redwood. (until BB Corp nixed that idea too).

It seems to be there must have been something else other than those 2.5 trips that did it...

[Mr. Cohen]

I never really thought acid seemed to do that much damage to Brian. He was already freaking out about his success before he took illegal drugs. It was sort of inevitable that the pressures of stardom would be his undoing. He had too much talent not to shine, but was not fit to cope with the personal effects of it. If anything, you could almost frame his use of drugs and the subsequent psychedelic music as a sort of rebellion towards the people that were trying to control and use him, either overtly or inadvertently, for their own benefit. It had to be very unnerving to have your entire family heavily involved with and dependent on your artistic muse. "In My Room" and "Warmth of the Sun", among others, show Brian wanting to be move in a more spiritual direction from the very beginning.

I think it's easy for Brian to blame acid now because not that many people understand it and so it becomes an easy scapegoat. If his acid use was so immediately devastating, why was he glorifying it for several years afterwards? I think his amphetamine use had way more to do with SMiLE's collapse then acid.

[Chris Brown]

I agree with you on this one Dada...I think the only thing the acid did was to exacerbate Brian's already-present mental illness.  It is clear that he already had some problems...the dude had a nervous breakdown at 22 for crying out loud.  The more into drugs he got (weed, LSD, speed, etc.), the more accelerated his mental decline became. 

We all know the crazy stories of paranoia from the Smile era.  Perhaps the LSD took him to a place that made him more paranoid, and ultimately sped up his inevidable downfall.  I tend to think of the LSD as a catalyst for something that would have happened anyways (though perhaps to a lesser degree).  It isn't as black and white as "Brian was perfectly fine, took LSD and went crazy."

[Sheriff John Stone]

Loaf, your thread is in danger of turning into a drugs vs. mental illness and chicken before the egg debate. Did we ever have an official debate about that? Which came first, which led to which, and would Brian have been OK without which one? Man, that could go on for pages and pages....

We're not doctors, shrinks, or (I don't think) people who took the quantity of drugs that Brian did. We don't know Brian, or ALL of his medical history. But that never kept me/us from speculating before! Yes, one can lead to the other and vice versa, but, for what it's worth (actually, nothing), I've always put more "blame" on the drugs than the mental illness.

[GLarson432]

This doesn't quite fit the timeline being discussed and doesn't necessarily involve LSD but... close enough.

This is from Phil FANG Volk's website.  www.philfangvolk.com   He was the bass player for the original Paul Revere & The Raiders for those too young to know or those who lost too many brain cells along the way!  I think it's a good website which deserves broader reading to understand this guy's perspective and a good insight into the era but to get to this specific spot on his site click History then scroll down to Ricky Nelson's Stone Canyon Band 1970.  This is about halfway down just below the picture of the Nelson family on the staircase.  He was back on the road with Paul Revere during a hiatus with Ricky Nelson.

"The strange part about this gig I did with Paul in 1970 was the fact that Brian Wilson made one of his rare appearances with the band and he kind of sat at the piano in a semi-catatonic state during the show occasionally singing and playing, and occasionally just staring into space. After the show, he dashed from the stage, ran out the back stage door, and proceeded to crawl his way up a steep grassy knoll, where he continually slipped backwards from the damp grass on the slope. He was screaming and crying like somebody was hurting him or chasing after him, and he was trying to escape. His wife followed him up the hill, reassuring him that no one was chasing him, that all was safe, and he didn't need to be afraid. There was no riot, no crowd scenes, no fans pulling on his clothes or hair, and it was safe to come back inside the auditorium. It was quite a sight for me to behold. This once magnificently creative and powerful songwriter/composer/musician and leader of one of the greatest bands in rock history was having a major paranoid, delusional episode right in front of our eyes, and it was scary to me that he was so out of touch with reality. His wife and bandmates had apparently seen this quite often in different variations, and they all seemed fairly underwhelmed with the whole episode– took it in stride– as if it was business as usual, but for me, it was shocking and sickening to witness. Not long after that, he spent the next few years of his life under his blankets at home with a 24hour a day therapist by his side trying to get him back in touch with the real world. Finally after so many years, it's nice to see him back in the loop, recording and touring again at age 60, but I'm sure the rehabilitation was a very long, and dark period in his life. I'm sure he suffered a great deal, but I often wonder how his excessive drug use in his "glory days" may have contributed to his tragic demise into "never-neverland." I've wondered the same about the tragic loss of Rick Nelson..."

The paragraph quoted continues and so does Phil's story but that's the BW part.

[variable2]

I think Brian said it best, some good few years ago: "LSD blew my mind and I came back in about a million pieces". Doesn't sound at all positive to me.

Didn't he say "came back in I don't know how many pieces"?

[Jay]

I'm not sure that LSD is completely to blame. I think the fact that he was already experienceing the affects of being paranoid schitzophrenic didnt help. I'm sure the acid only worsened the symptoms.

Not to make this a drug forum or anything but was the acid of the late 60's more powerful than the acid of today? I'm not a burnout or anything but I have had a few experiences with Liquid LSD in my early 20's. It was powerful but I dont ever remember feeling completely out of control. Maybe the LSD from back then was just stronger. Maybe Brain had a connection with Owsley:) .  Any of you guys around back in the day to comment?

The acid back then was whole orders of magnitude stronger - the stuff Brian took was very pure.

This may not be accurate, but I read somewhere that one dose back in the 60's was about ten times more powerful than the acid of today.

[MBE]

This doesn't quite fit the timeline being discussed and doesn't necessarily involve LSD but... close enough.

This is from Phil FANG Volk's website.  www.philfangvolk.com   He was the bass player for the original Paul Revere & The Raiders for those too young to know or those who lost too many brain cells along the way!  I think it's a good website which deserves broader reading to understand this guy's perspective and a good insight into the era but to get to this specific spot on his site click History then scroll down to Ricky Nelson's Stone Canyon Band 1970.  This is about halfway down just below the picture of the Nelson family on the staircase.  He was back on the road with Paul Revere during a hiatus with Ricky Nelson.

"The strange part about this gig I did with Paul in 1970 was the fact that Brian Wilson made one of his rare appearances with the band and he kind of sat at the piano in a semi-catatonic state during the show occasionally singing and playing, and occasionally just staring into space. After the show, he dashed from the stage, ran out the back stage door, and proceeded to crawl his way up a steep grassy knoll, where he continually slipped backwards from the damp grass on the slope. He was screaming and crying like somebody was hurting him or chasing after him, and he was trying to escape. His wife followed him up the hill, reassuring him that no one was chasing him, that all was safe, and he didn't need to be afraid. There was no riot, no crowd scenes, no fans pulling on his clothes or hair, and it was safe to come back inside the auditorium. It was quite a sight for me to behold. This once magnificently creative and powerful songwriter/composer/musician and leader of one of the greatest bands in rock history was having a major paranoid, delusional episode right in front of our eyes, and it was scary to me that he was so out of touch with reality. His wife and bandmates had apparently seen this quite often in different variations, and they all seemed fairly underwhelmed with the whole episode– took it in stride– as if it was business as usual, but for me, it was shocking and sickening to witness. Not long after that, he spent the next few years of his life under his blankets at home with a 24hour a day therapist by his side trying to get him back in touch with the real world. Finally after so many years, it's nice to see him back in the loop, recording and touring again at age 60, but I'm sure the rehabilitation was a very long, and dark period in his life. I'm sure he suffered a great deal, but I often wonder how his excessive drug use in his "glory days" may have contributed to his tragic demise into "never-neverland." I've wondered the same about the tragic loss of Rick Nelson..."

The paragraph quoted continues and so does Phil's story but that's the BW part.

Jon Stebbins wrote about it in his book, but he had it more as a panic attack followed by a successful show. From the tape I can hear Brian do many parts. I know it's muddy but his voice has a certain resonance with me. Considering Brian called the tour the best three days of my life in an interview later that year I put Phill's story in a milder perspective. Again photos of Brian on stage in 1970 seem to have him pretty with it. Maybe not 1964 Brian but not 1976 Brian either.
Going back to drugs directly I think LSD hurt him, but cocaine probably did the most damge along with Landy's meds.

[Shane]

As I understand it, the "LSD" of today actually isn't LSD.  Real LSD is very difficult to synthesize, and a substitute has now come into use, which mixes LSD type effects with an "upper".  I think I read that in the wikipedia article on LSD.

[Daniel S.]

This doesn't quite fit the timeline being discussed and doesn't necessarily involve LSD but... close enough.

This is from Phil FANG Volk's website.  www.philfangvolk.com   He was the bass player for the original Paul Revere & The Raiders for those too young to know or those who lost too many brain cells along the way!  I think it's a good website which deserves broader reading to understand this guy's perspective and a good insight into the era but to get to this specific spot on his site click History then scroll down to Ricky Nelson's Stone Canyon Band 1970.  This is about halfway down just below the picture of the Nelson family on the staircase.  He was back on the road with Paul Revere during a hiatus with Ricky Nelson.

"The strange part about this gig I did with Paul in 1970 was the fact that Brian Wilson made one of his rare appearances with the band and he kind of sat at the piano in a semi-catatonic state during the show occasionally singing and playing, and occasionally just staring into space. After the show, he dashed from the stage, ran out the back stage door, and proceeded to crawl his way up a steep grassy knoll, where he continually slipped backwards from the damp grass on the slope. He was screaming and crying like somebody was hurting him or chasing after him, and he was trying to escape. His wife followed him up the hill, reassuring him that no one was chasing him, that all was safe, and he didn't need to be afraid. There was no riot, no crowd scenes, no fans pulling on his clothes or hair, and it was safe to come back inside the auditorium. It was quite a sight for me to behold. This once magnificently creative and powerful songwriter/composer/musician and leader of one of the greatest bands in rock history was having a major paranoid, delusional episode right in front of our eyes, and it was scary to me that he was so out of touch with reality. His wife and bandmates had apparently seen this quite often in different variations, and they all seemed fairly underwhelmed with the whole episode– took it in stride– as if it was business as usual, but for me, it was shocking and sickening to witness. Not long after that, he spent the next few years of his life under his blankets at home with a 24hour a day therapist by his side trying to get him back in touch with the real world. Finally after so many years, it's nice to see him back in the loop, recording and touring again at age 60, but I'm sure the rehabilitation was a very long, and dark period in his life. I'm sure he suffered a great deal, but I often wonder how his excessive drug use in his "glory days" may have contributed to his tragic demise into "never-neverland." I've wondered the same about the tragic loss of Rick Nelson..."

The paragraph quoted continues and so does Phil's story but that's the BW part.

Thanks for sharing this story. I'd never heard it before. I appreciate stories like this because I sometimes feel bad wondering if Brian had it in him to make more great music, and then I realize he is a sick person and has been that way for a LONG time.

[The Heartical Don]

I am quite sure LSD can liberate the worst, but halfway repressed, 'neutralized', memories in a person who went through trauma. If you compare a war veteran with a person who never fought, I'd say the first could pay the price for its use the rest of his life, whilst the other may emerge without any damage.

[Sheriff John Stone]

This doesn't quite fit the timeline being discussed and doesn't necessarily involve LSD but... close enough.

This is from Phil FANG Volk's website.  www.philfangvolk.com   He was the bass player for the original Paul Revere & The Raiders for those too young to know or those who lost too many brain cells along the way!  I think it's a good website which deserves broader reading to understand this guy's perspective and a good insight into the era but to get to this specific spot on his site click History then scroll down to Ricky Nelson's Stone Canyon Band 1970.  This is about halfway down just below the picture of the Nelson family on the staircase.  He was back on the road with Paul Revere during a hiatus with Ricky Nelson.

"The strange part about this gig I did with Paul in 1970 was the fact that Brian Wilson made one of his rare appearances with the band and he kind of sat at the piano in a semi-catatonic state during the show occasionally singing and playing, and occasionally just staring into space. After the show, he dashed from the stage, ran out the back stage door, and proceeded to crawl his way up a steep grassy knoll, where he continually slipped backwards from the damp grass on the slope. He was screaming and crying like somebody was hurting him or chasing after him, and he was trying to escape. His wife followed him up the hill, reassuring him that no one was chasing him, that all was safe, and he didn't need to be afraid. There was no riot, no crowd scenes, no fans pulling on his clothes or hair, and it was safe to come back inside the auditorium. It was quite a sight for me to behold. This once magnificently creative and powerful songwriter/composer/musician and leader of one of the greatest bands in rock history was having a major paranoid, delusional episode right in front of our eyes, and it was scary to me that he was so out of touch with reality. His wife and bandmates had apparently seen this quite often in different variations, and they all seemed fairly underwhelmed with the whole episode– took it in stride– as if it was business as usual, but for me, it was shocking and sickening to witness. Not long after that, he spent the next few years of his life under his blankets at home with a 24hour a day therapist by his side trying to get him back in touch with the real world. Finally after so many years, it's nice to see him back in the loop, recording and touring again at age 60, but I'm sure the rehabilitation was a very long, and dark period in his life. I'm sure he suffered a great deal, but I often wonder how his excessive drug use in his "glory days" may have contributed to his tragic demise into "never-neverland." I've wondered the same about the tragic loss of Rick Nelson..."

The paragraph quoted continues and so does Phil's story but that's the BW part.

Thanks for sharing this story. I'd never heard it before. I appreciate stories like this because I sometimes feel bad wondering if Brian had it in him to make more great music, and then I realize he is a sick person and has been that way for a LONG time.

Yeah, thanks GLarson. And, you're right, Heywood. But, think about Marilyn; what a nightmare life it must have been for her throughout much of that period 1965 - 1977. We talk a lot about how Mike must've felt, seeing his cousin disintegrate in front of his eyes, but to see it happen with your husband....

[Uncomfortable Seat]

No LSD, no Pet Sounds.  IMO, period.   

[Sheriff John Stone]

No LSD, no Pet Sounds.  IMO, period.   

OK, Loren.

[Chris Brown]

No LSD, no Pet Sounds.  IMO, period.   

Substitute Smile (or Good Vibrations) for Pet Sounds and I'd be inclined to agree, but Rubber Soul is the main reason for the existence of Pet Sounds, not LSD.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Maybe no intro to California Girls, I'll grant you that.

[petsite]

Like alcohol, which they have now proven "tickles" certain receptors in the brain and causes an addiction to that substance, so to do other drugs. Here is the thing: If your brain chemistry is "on the edge" as Brian's was, it only takes something that alters that to cause lasting damage. Thing about penicillin. Thousand of people take it with nothing but positive effects (destroying infections within their bodies). The some people take the same drug and it causes  shock and sometimes kills people. I think the same has to be said for all drugs. Just because thousands can take it with no lasting effects doesn't mean everyone can. And I will tell you, as a child of the 70's, I got really really tired of telling people I don't get high only to get the "WTF is wrong with you?!" retort. Of course, several friends are dead now from drugs....so........

[Daniel S.]

I'm not a musician and don't play any instruments, so I don't really understand when people say LSD and other drugs made it possible for Brian to compose his best music. Don't you think he was probably more influenced by what his contemporaries were doing and his own musical taste?

[Bean Bag]

Drugs set the mood lighting.  Lighting is everything in movies.

[grillo]

I'm not a musician and don't play any instruments, so I don't really understand when people say LSD and other drugs made it possible for Brian to compose his best music. Don't you think he was probably more influenced by what his contemporaries were doing and his own musical taste?

I think drugs can help one get to a more creative place way faster and easier, occasionally, even booze. I mean, it can't be argued that most of the great albums weren't made by folks who were totally wasted often.