“T hey'll get you anything with that evil smile; everybody's got a drug dealer on speed dial, well .” These are the lyrics from Nickelback's famous number, Rockstar . What is with these superstars and rockstars with drugs and booze? Over 50 musicians have died because of drug overdose or alcoholism. “They are too weak to deal with that kind of fame.
Also, it could be because musicians take to drugs, which make them less socially inhibited and lets them defy social norms; true beauty can be achieved through making music in that free state of mind. But then some people take it because of the same reason a college kid takes his first drag of cigarette: peer pressure, It's the parties they go to, the places they hang out at. Drugs become unavoidable,” says Aditya Jonnavittula, an AC/DC fan.
Fame takes spin on the psyche. When you have lots of money, people who would do anything to catch a glimpse of you and a lot of time to do what you like, Drugs become the only ‘true' friends.
Rohini Chaterji, who's writing a thesis on ‘Rock and Roll and Drugs', says, “In its heydays it had other connotation for peace and stuff, especially in the 1960s. Drugs were used as form of social dissent but now it's used as way of having fun and getting away from reality.” Many rock musicians have acknowledged having been addicts and many of them have managed to come out of the addiction maze. Vikram Vivekanand, guitarist of the band, Grey Shack says, “It's a dependency more than an addiction. Eric Clapton could never write without the influence of drugs. He landed in rehab thrice— twice for drug addiction, and after he got out of that, it was alcohol addiction.It was a way of life. He's been sober now though for over 20 years.”
Whatever said and done, every musician's addiction death has been proving that rock and roll seems to be incomplete without sex and drugs.
