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Discussion => Off topic => Topic started by: joywind on June 02, 2013, 06:22 am
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It’s long been understood what happened at Grateful Dead concerts throughout the band’s existence, and probably at any show involving Phil Lesh or Bob Weir these days. Without implicating anyone in particular, “Deadheads” regularly consumed large amounts of drugs, most notably LSD or “acid”.
If you’re one of these fans, don’t worry, your secret is safe as long as you keep it to yourself. But a certain large group of Deadheads from one night couldn’t help but publicize their own LSD-induced trips – because they hadn’t knowingly done the drug.
On this day in 1971 at the Winterland Arena in San Francisco, the Dead performed for the second of two nights. But the night before was the one that aroused suspicion: around 1,000 fans at the show innocently got some seemingly harmless apple cider, only to discover that the drinks had been spiked with LSD. One can assume the realization came sometime between the unicorns and the magic carpet ride.
The fans’ bad trips didn’t go unreported: The Los Angeles Times wrote two days later that over 30 fans went to the hospital after suffering intense hallucinations.
The report also includes the account of a fan who said the arena’s P.A. system encouraged people to share their cider: “Those of you who are going to get some liquid refreshment, pass it on so your neighbor can have some.”
Forty-two years later, the question as to who spiked the drinks remains unanswered and may stay that way forever.
Legendary promoter Bill Graham, who organized the show, lashed out at a press conference soon after the incident when authorities threatened the venue with revoking its license: “‘You don’t just close down an establishment because once, for the first time in five years and 1,300 concerts, this happens…Just because there’s a train accident, you don’t take the trains off the tracks.’” Graham was too smart to put his career at risk just to get some fans high, so he can be ruled out.
The Grateful Dead had previously gotten a large amount of LSD supplied to them regularly by their original audio engineer Owsley Stanley, who became a “legend” for producing and popularizing the drug. He called his widespread LSD distribution “community service” to the San Francisco Chronicle in 2007. He is estimated to have produced over a million doses in the late-60s alone.
But Stanley couldn’t have had anything to do with the 1971 incident because he was in prison for a drug bust (also involving members of the Dead) at the time. He unfortunately died in a car accident in 2011, so we will never get the truth from him.
That leaves one obvious suspect: the Grateful Dead themselves. It’s pretty clear in retrospect that they wanted their fans to have a mind-bending adventure at their shows, not just enjoy a little live music. Though Jerry Garcia & Co. were never formally accused or charged with anything, it’s hard not to suspect a band known for their exploits with psychedelic drugs to be the ones that passed around acid-laden cider. It could have been their way of making sure not one fan went without a long, strange trip.
What do you think happened that night? Better yet, were you there? Share your thoughts in the comments.
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I have heard of this story before. I believe that the band wanted to hydrate the audience and along the way the cider was being passed around someone emptied their liquid lsd into the cider.
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Could just be an urban legend too..
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I think it was awful to spike the cider with LSD!
Although it may seem funny, many fans would have drank a lot of cider and nobody knows how many ug's were contained in each 500ml serving for example.
I have taken lsd ;D But you really need to be in the right frame of mind and to be prepared beforehand. At the very least, have some valium ready because that is all A&E will do at the hospital!
LSD can cause psychosis and could easily trigger a variety of mental issues.
One of my former jobs was a secetary in an institution for people who had mental breakdowns. It was not uncommon for some drugs to be a trigger if not cause of the mental state they were in.
Alcohol was the No 1 drug of abuse.