Albion Dreaming (23 page)

In the early days of LSD use those who were primarily attracted to it were creative individuals who sought out novelty, change and insight into the human condition. LSD provided this and much more. LSD radically altered one’s perception of the world and many users found they could not easily step back into the grey three dimensional worlds of work and superficial social relationships. The remaining years of the Sixties would see the LSD subculture develop further but the halcyon innocence of pre-legislation LSD were gone. The committed LSD users, whether rich Chelsea socialites such as Christopher Gibbs or working class
street hippies such as Dave Tomlin and the thousands in between, would need new sources of LSD. And that meant illegal LSD laboratories and the rise of the outlaw LSD chemist.

You know what happens when you take acid; your conceptual framework gets sort of ripped apart for a few hours. I think really the acid wave hit in 67.

Hoppy Hopkins
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T
he year 1967 is the one people most closely associate with hippies, the counter culture and LSD. It is a time often referred to in cultural shorthand as the “summer of love”, conjuring up images of flower-bedecked youth, the “love-in”, happenings and drug fuelled bacchanalia. At the start of the year LSD was still only of relatively minor interest to those not actively involved in its use. But there was a slowly intensifying background media buzz about the drug which, by the end of the year, would ensure no adult in Britain was ignorant of what “LSD” meant or what the drug represented.

Anyone intrigued by LSD may have spent the dying days of 1966 being mildly amused by the record given away with 23 December issue of the satirical magazine
Private Eye
. Mystery vocalist Whispering Jim Narg wrote and sang one of the tracks, “Psychedelic Baby”, the lyric imploring:

Psychedelic baby, won’t you take a trip with me
Dip your lump of sugar in the LSD
If you want a kinky caper
Then suck the blotting paper
Psychedelic baby, with me.
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The significance of this little known song is that it is the first time the term LSD or psychedelic appears in British music. The Pretty Things had cut a song the year before called “£.S.D”. The chorus ran “yes I need LSD”
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and though clearly about the drug both the lyrics and the way the title was written were done to make people think it was about money, not drugs. Narg’s song, therefore, was the first to refer directly to the drug. It is also noteworthy for being the earliest public reference to blotting paper being used as a carrier for LSD. That
Private Eye
was satirizing the drug was proof positive that it was now a well-established part of the swinging London scene. Whispering Jim Narg was Dudley Moore, one of the new wave of young, university-educated English comedians. Moore, incidentally, was a patient and friend of John Riley, the private dentist who turned John Lennon and George Harrison on to LSD in 1966. In January 1967, Moore, together with comedy partner and
Private Eye
founder Peter Cook, released the single “L.S. Bumble Bee” of which he said: “Peter Cook and I recorded that song about the time when there was so much fuss about LSD, and when everybody thought that ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ was a reference to drugs. The exciting alternative offered to the world was L.S.B!”
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On 17 January, while the Beatles were in the studio putting the finishing touches to their forthcoming LP
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
, John Esam and Russell Page’s trial for distributing LSD came to a dramatic conclusion in London’s Central Criminal Court. The prosecution was confident that the discovery of LSD allegedly worth over £100,000 would result in conviction and a lengthy sentence for the defendants. They had even engaged the services of Dr. Albert Hofmann, the creator of LSD, who flew in from Switzerland to give evidence at the trial. But Esam, equally confident he had done nothing wrong, mounted
a vigorous defence. He engaged the services of Professor Ernest Chain, who had won a Nobel Prize for his work in developing penicillin as an antibiotic.

Chain took the witness stand and argued that LSD did not conform to the poison rules in existence at the time of the raid, and therefore Esam could not be found guilty. Hofmann claimed LSD could be termed a poison and therefore came under the Poisons Act. Neither side would back down, so the decision was left to the jury who accepted Chain’s evidence. The judge had little option but to acquit Esam and Page of conspiring unlawfully to sell LSD. After the trial Judge Graham Roberts was at pains to point out to the press that LSD was now illegal to possess or sell and that: “It is important that this should be known so that other people do not think the jury’s verdict is a licence to use this drug, because it is not.”
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The popular media were disappointed. They had been watching Esam’s trial with interest, hoping he would be found guilty so they could run yet another series of self righteous LSD exposés on the back of his court case. Esam’s acquittal took the sheen off the media’s zeal but didn’t deter them from bringing LSD to the public’s attention again. Just as they had done in the early months of 1966, journalists had once again been scouring London’s pubs and clubs in an attempt to dig some dirt on LSD users. Now they were focusing on the use of LSD by musicians, a quest stimulated by several pop musicians’ reference to LSD in their lyrics and in interviews.

Donovan, the psychedelic troubadour who had already made oblique reference to LSD and the Cromwell Road scene in a 1966 song, was their first target. On the last Sunday in January the
News of the World
ran a two page investigation into his drug habits. “Sunshine Superman”, the title track from his as yet unreleased LP was heading up the pop charts in Britain and the
News of the World
immediately seized on the opening line: “Sunshine came softly through my window today, could have tripped out easy but I’ve changed my ways.” The fact that this was a song recorded over a year previously and the lyric claimed he’d changed his drug taking ways was immaterial to the paper as they delved further
into the song. “I’ll pick up your hand and slowly blow your little mind” was also evidence to the journalists that Donovan was actively trying to corrupt the morals of his listeners.
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Journalists were dispatched to chat, incognito, to Donovan at a “happening” at 101 Cromwell Road. Their alleged conversations with the singer were earnestly repeated verbatim for the readers, Donovan claiming he used LSD regularly. The paper also found a fan, Suzanne Lloyd, who claimed she had fallen under Donovan’s spell and lived at his flat for a while where she saw Donovan and friends often taking LSD.

Though there was some truth in the
News of the World’s
exposé of Donovan’s lifestyle, the tone was one of pure sensationalism. The Move, another pop group who were turning psychedelic, were also fingered as LSD fiends in the same article. Their single, “Night of Fear”, which reached number two in the pop charts, was examined and lyrics such as “Your brain calls out for help that’s never there/The silent night has turned to a night of fear” and a chorus of “Just about to flip your mind, just about to trip your mind”, were offered up as evidence of The Move’s interest in LSD.
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For their investigation in the following Sunday’s edition, the
News of the World
changed their target and went after the Moody Blues. Once again they delved into interviews and lyrics, pulling out anything which even hinted at drug use. The group’s house close to the River Thames at Roehampton was identified as a place where they and other musicians regularly took LSD. This exposé had little impact on the band whose manager, Phil Robertson, was open about their use of LSD, freely admitting the band used the drug. LSD philosophy began to permeate the Moody Blues’ lyrics and song titles; their 1968 LP
In Search of the Lost Chord
featured the track “Legend of a Mind”, written about Tim Leary and with lines like, “To the little man who sells you thrills along the pier. He’ll take you up, he’ll bring you down”.
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In their third portrayal of the music and LSD scene in Britain the
News of the World
dug a little deeper. They correctly identified the London Free School and
International Times
as being focuses for LSD use and information and linked Pink Floyd with the emerging psychedelic drug scene. Tim Leary’s role in the psychedelic
revolution was also acknowledged, his book
The Psychedelic Experience
, being referred to as “... a sort of text book for the LSD cult ...”
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As they had done in 1966, the
News of the World
, under the guise of informing their readers about the growing use of LSD, had actually acted as an advertisement for the drug. Even in early 1967 there were still far fewer users of LSD than the media imagined. By explaining exactly what LSD was, its cost and its effects,
News of the World
gave thousands of teenagers a glimpse into a way of life they desperately wanted to be part of. Associating LSD’s use with pop and rock musicians and explaining the drug references in their lyrics enabled any adolescent with a sense of adventure easy access to all he or she needed to know to get involved in psychedelia. To an extent the unwitting media promotion of LSD led to thousands of young people throughout Britain becoming more knowledgeable about the drug than they would otherwise have been. As the winter of 1967 thawed into the warmer months, many of them trekked to London and other large conurbations to seek and join the LSD scenes there.

The power of the press in promoting LSD use cannot be underestimated. The media may not have actually caused anyone to take LSD against their wishes but their detailed reporting of its effects, prices and availability did everything but that. Record Producer Dave “Boss” Goodman recalls that as a mod he first came across LSD in the
News of the World
and the report he read made him immediately want to obtain some of the drug. Within a short period of time he was heavily involved in LSD dealing: “Down in the basement we’ve got the bottles we used to mix the crystal acid with distilled water and drip it in single trips onto sugar cubes or blotting paper.”
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LSD was available to the
News of the World
reporters at between 30 shillings (£1.50) and £2 per dose, either on sugar cubes or on blotting paper. LSD powder in capsules and pill form was also on offer and it was clear from the media coverage in the first few months of 1967 that LSD could be obtained easily in most of Britain’s major cities. Sandoz’s decision to stop supplying it to the medical profession seemed to have had no effect on the supply
so it was clear that LSD for recreational use wasn’t coming from them. But just where the drug was coming from was a mystery to the media and the police. No LSD had as yet been seized by customs and no British LSD laboratories had been located. But the Metropolitan Police’s Drug Squad had picked up vague hints and rumours that a major LSD laboratory was operating in London and was supplying not only much of the high quality LSD available in the capital but was also exporting it to the USA. All they had to do was find it.

In their attempt to alert the British public to the supposed dangers of LSD the
News of the World
made a serious error in the 5 February edition of the paper. Among the truths, half-truths and speculations about the drug habits of pop musicians was a paragraph which read: “Another pop idol who admits he has sampled LSD and other drugs is Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones. He too was a visitor at the Roehampton home of the Moody Blues.”
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Jagger was horrified and immediately issued a statement: “I am shocked that a responsible paper like the
News of the World
can publish such a defamatory article about me. I want to make it quite clear that this picture of me is misleading and untrue, and therefore the only way left for me to prevent this libel being repeated is for me to ask my lawyer to take action in the High Court immediately.” The Rolling Stones appeared on the Eamon Andrews show that same evening and Jagger made clear his intent to sue the paper. Two days later Jagger’s lawyer issued a libel writ against the
News of the World
.
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By issuing a legal challenge to one of Britain’s most powerful and wealthy newspapers Jagger must have known he was taking a risk. Not a financial risk – the Rolling Stones could easily play the money game – but the risk of further tabloid attention being focused on the Stones’ bohemian lifestyle. As a consequence of the writ, Jagger and the Rolling Stones were pursued by journalists even more than was usual for the next few days. The following Saturday after an evening recording session Jagger, his girlfriend Marianne Faithful and Keith Richards, together with several others from the Stones’ inner circle, drove down to Richards’ moated country residence, Redlands, in Sussex. George Harrison and his girlfriend joined them later.

After partying long into the night the Stones and their entourage were woken the following morning by one David Schneiderman and offered a tab of white lightning LSD with their cup of tea. Several of the group accepted the offer and the day dissolved into a psychedelic haze as they drove round the wintry Sussex countryside. Richards: “The weird twist is that we were all on acid ... and I’m seeing bursts, angels flying around.” In the evening as they were coming down from the LSD, the police arrived with a warrant. All the guests were searched and questioned and a variety of substances were taken away for analysis.
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