Music

Watch an animated John Lennon describe his first acid trip

by Richard Howard

It’s sort of hard to have a normal story about your first acid trip. That being said, when you’re in the greatest rock band of all time, have a penchant for shenanigans, and are “always on speed” (his words, not mine), the event is likely going to be even more fucked up than your ‘run-of-the-mill’ LSD tale.

First of all, Lennon’s first acid trip wasn’t even consensual. He, George Harrison and their respective wives had popped on over their friend and (presumably soon to be former) dentist John Riley’s house for what was supposed to be a lovely British dinner party. Riley thanked them for coming by dropping acid in their coffee like a real asshole, then ominously telling the foursome “I advise you not to leave.”

Assuming the dentist was a horndog attempting to set up an orgy with his famous friends, Lennon and his crew bolted. They ended up at their favourite haunt, The Ad-Lib Club, where shit got crazy. Harrison proved to be a total boss, incidentally; driving the crew around all night while tripping balls and somehow not drowning them all in the Thames.

Perhaps the coolest part of the story is the end of Lennon’s trip. Staying up long after the others had gone to bed (speed is a hell of a drug), the legendary songwriter describes a hallucination that ties in with his weird love of submarines documented as early as 1964 in A Hard Day’s Night. And while “Yellow Submarine” was mostly a McCartney composition and described as by the band as an attempt “to write a children’s song,” it’s hard to believe the experience didn’t have some influence on the song.

In any case, it turns out we have a nymphomaniac dentist to thank for The Beatle’s most creative years. Who woulda thunk? [H/T RollingStone]