10 Songs You Didn't Know Were About Drugs
The songs that leave you unintentionally stoned...
It's no secret that drugs have been the inspiration for many great songs. While some composers delve deep into their artistic souls to pull out a piece of themselves, it's sometimes just as easy to write a song based on your love for your favorite substance. On the other hand, some of the greatest songs ever written have slipped drug references right under our noses.
As the decades have gone on, artists have found new and interesting ways to pass casual drug references under the radar in their songs. Whether it's laced in a metaphor or has a catchy melody, a lot of these songs have much more nefarious habits lying just underneath the surface. Instead of bopping along to a song about having fun, these tunes become a lot darker once you analyze the lyric sheet.
While some of the artists on this list have debated as to whether these songs are actually about drugs, it's kinda hard to take them at their word once you hear the lyrics in context. Let's a take a look at some of these supposedly innocent tracks and see what these guys are really trying to get at. Beware of the contact buzz.
10. A Passage to Bangkok - Rush
Rush have always been a band known for painting sonic pictures through their music. Every time the band released an album, you could count on a gargantuan cut from the record that could take you everywhere from the deep depths of space to the scenic beauty of Middle Earth. "A Passage to Bangkok" sounds like it should be one of those songs on the surface, but the real meat of the song is a bit more mind expanding.
Though the track is initially about travelling into the exotic Eastern countryside, Neil Peart has also been candid about the song's lyrics being written about the freedom of smoking weed. Even when putting together the basic track of the song, the band even found time to put in the simulated sound of someone taking a long toke before Alex Lifeson fires off his solo.
While the greater music public may not have got it, the band's core audience certainly did, with the band themselves noting the aromatic change in the audience whenever they played the song live.
Back then, Rush were known as the thinking man's rock band, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with writing a simple ode to the pleasures of getting high. After this album, Rush began to get more broader with their lyrics, but this stoned-out hard rocker speaks to every single slacker kid growing up in the 1970's.