Drug use in music has been a topic of discussion and debate since at least the 1930s, if not earlier. As stated in the old saying "wine, women and song", association of music with using various substances go back centuries. References to recreational drug use in various forms have been common as the modern record industry developed, particularly in terms of popular music genres such as pop rock singles, dance releases, and the like. Social, cultural, legal, and economic challenges to the existence of music referring to recreational drugs have prompted several studies on the link between such references and increased usage among teens and young adults. Findings over multiple decades have had mixed results. Many complicating factors exist; in particular, a song that describes substance abuse in a depressive, emotionally blank fashion may trigger curiosity for one listener as well as revulsion for another. Sporadic calls for music censorship in different countries over the past decades have also had vastly different outcomes.
Multiple musical artists have attracted a public image associated with neutral to positive depictions of drug use in their releases, while others have created works with negative depictions of drug use that condemn individuals such as dealers and suppliers. These issues cut across lines of nationality, age, race, gender, and musical genre, with contrasting examples such as hard rocker Pete Townshend of The Who (labeling irresponsible musical artists who defy their fans and embrace materialistic drug use as "decadent assholes") as well as dance pop star Miley Cyrus (being openly frank about her embrace of cocaine and MDMA usage) both getting press attention for their views. As well, some artists argue that popular interpretations of their work misunderstand the intent, such as country and folk star John Denver having to persuade critics against hearing hidden innuendo in his hit song "Rocky Mountain High".
History
Some prominent songs referred to recreational drug use back into even the 1930s. For instance, the W.C. Fields vehicle International House, a bawdy comedy film released in 1933, featured Cab Calloway doing the tune "Reefer Man". The fact that many jazz and swing music artists were frank with each other about cannabis usage, touching on the matter even in song lyrics, attracted critical attention at the time. Well known music magazine Radio Stars printed a sensationalist article in 1938 by journalist Jack Hanley titled "Exposing the Marijuana Drug Evil in Swing Bands". Hanley recounted, "One leader told me of a young man in his band who was a crackerjack musician, but who used the weed so consistently that he was quite undependable. The fits of deep depression reefers so often, [sic] produce would seize him until he had to be restrained, [sic] from suicide." The track "If You're a Viper", composed by Stuff Smith and first recorded by his group in 1936, provides another example of the few tracks that made things deeply explicit before the 1960s.
In the midst of the Vietnam War and the massive social movements shifting the U.S. cultural ground in the 1950s and 1960s, evolution continued as more and more music began being produced that sent heavily controversial messages. Traditionalist-minded individuals expressed outrage at the commercial success of tracks with anti-war slants, with frank discussions of teenage lust, and the like. As stated by a Cumberland University produced study on the matter, "It was not until the aftermath of the sixties youth counterculture ... that drug lyrics became a recurring musical motif."
References to drugs can be found most abundantly in multiple types of music during the 1960s and 1970s. The new subgenre of pop and rock known as psychedelic music started becoming completely mainstream during the former decade. After 1966, with the release of The Beatles' album Revolver, regular audiences embraced eccentric sounds such as those in the song "Tomorrow Never Knows". As well, group The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds and The Byrds' various singles, particularly "Eight Miles High", also made the drug-influenced style an integral part of popularly known, mainstream commercial music made by American bands. Things were rapidly changing as many more musical outfits filtered in and out into the American mass media, styles later regarded as garage rock, proto-powerpop, and proto-punk achieved sporadic interest. Concept albums in which drug references existed within song after song such as Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (also by The Beatles) and Tommy (by The Who) became popular, and the broader counterculture itself evolved in different, changing ways as the sixties went on. Drugs became much more common and easier to obtain in terms of mass production, and other, even newer subgenres of music such as acid rock picked up acclaim due to efforts by groups such as Cream (band), Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Doors, and the Grateful Dead. Mass media evolved to the point that having references to drug use in songs became so common as to be considered 'normal'.
The late-60s in particular became labeled as a "sensory blizzard" due to the imagery and sound explored by multiple bands. As a specific example, rock band Small Faces ended up getting away with releasing two large scale singles with explicit drug references, "Here Come the Nice" and "Itchycoo Park", that proved to be two of their most iconic hits. "Itchycoo Park" functioned as arguably 1967's 'song of the summer' in the UK. That bureaucracies such as the BBC allowed radio airplay for as many experimentally minded songs as they did surprised many. The Beatles, widely regarded as the greatest and most influential pop and rock group in modern history, drew influence from its members drug usage and made copious references to the fact in their music. In 1972, band member John Lennon remarked that "Rubber Soul was the pot album and Revolver was the acid."
Beatles' songs directly taking influence from the band members' drug habits at the time include "Day Tripper", "Got to Get You into My Life", and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", among others. The lyrical content and tone varies much between the group's many songs, and some records feature complex meanings beyond being just 'anti-drugs' or 'pro-drugs'. For example, 1965's "Day Tripper" focuses lyrically on criticizing a woman who's "taking the easy way out" of her life's troubles and is "a big teaser" while musically being an upbeat, poppy track. Songwriters John Lennon and Paul McCartney later commented that the record criticized "weekend hippies" from their then position of being "full-time trippers" committed to using drugs experimentally.
Eventually, however, the deaths of prominent musical artists such as Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones, Janis Joplin, and Jim Morrison, all of which who had their own substance dependence as a direct contributor to their deaths, help contribute to anti-drug messages becoming more prominent in popular music. While many artists still criticized drug prohibition as well as other matters of government social policy, the toll taken in people's personal lives through addiction caused multiple songwriters to portray dealing and usage in more of a condemning, negative fashion. Despite its band members' highly publicized dalliances with illegal drugs, the group The Rolling Stones in particular created several songs with a negative tone to them regarding drugs after the death of Brian Jones such as 1971's "Sister Morphine", a track in which an individual is described surviving a terrible car crash, asking for morphine, and sadly dying from his injuries.
During the development of hip-hop music and related genres that were then avant-garde, such as songs by electro artists, many DJs and MCs felt a strong desire to touch on real-life issues among their listeners, particularly discussing matters such as street violence, drug use, and economic inequality. Fans in the African-American and Hispanic-American communities in particular often appreciated the honesty and frankness even as it made the music controversial. Politically-themed tracks and other protest songs during the old school hip-hop era frequently condemned "dealers", "pushers", and the like for contributing to holding young people back. One example is the Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five track "The Message", which includes the lyrics: "You'll admire all the number-book takers, thugs, pimps and pushers and the big money-makers ... [b]ut now your eyes sing the sad, sad song of how you lived so fast and died so young". The song came out in 1982.
In the mid-2010s, MDMA was frequently referred to popular music, specially "molly", a purportedly purified version of the drug. This coincided with the rising popularity of electronic dance music, which had developed a drug culture around MDMA and LSD since the Second Summer of Love of 1988–89. Examples include hits "We Can't Stop" by Miley Cyrus (which also references cocaine use), "Diamonds" by Rihanna, and Madonna's album MDNA, whose title refers to the drug. Hip hop artists such as 2 Chainz, Trinidad James, Rick Ross, Kanye West, and Jay-Z have all referenced "molly" in their music. Multiple media outlets, including The Guardian, The Huffington Post, and Fox News, reported on the increasing mentions of the drug in mass-marketed music in 2013.
Starting in the 1990s, the drug lean, also known as "purple drank" or "sizzurp", became prominent in hip-hop culture, emerging from southern cities such as Houston and Memphis. Figures such as DJ Screw and UGK helped popularize the drug in hip-hop with their signature "chopped and screwed" sound, a hazy, distorted style of music that reflected the effects of lean. Examples of songs that mention lean include "Sippin' on Some Sizzurp" by Three 6 Mafia, "Codeine Crazy" by Future, and "Purple Stuff" by Big Moe. The rising prominence of lean in hip-hop culture has been cited as problematic, with many artists such as DJ Screw, Pimp C, and Big Moe passing from causes related to lean consumption.
Rapper Rick Ross' comments in the song "U.O.E.N.O.", in which he describes spiking a woman's champagne with illegal drugs and then taking her back to his home for sex without her consent, created enough of a public outcry that the artist publicly apologized. However, pressure on the company Reebok continued, and it decided to terminate its marketing deal with Ross in April 2013. An estimated $3.5-5 million loss occurred for the entertainer.
In terms of the rest of the 2010s, music journalists such as Jason Lipshutz of Billboard have commented that references to illegal drugs remain a highly common topic in mainstream music. He remarked in October 2015 that beyond just the "loads of modern hip-hop hits linger[ing] on hard drug use and addiction" there is "an interesting trend" developing in terms of "the population of pop songs that don't just passively nod to drug use, but make it their lyrical focal point." He wrote, "In some ways, popular music hasn't been this high since the late 60's, when the Beatles, the Doors and Janis Joplin were turning their trips into hit records." Singer-songwriter Abel Tesfaye, known professionally as The Weeknd, is an example given the popularity of his songs such as "Can't Feel My Face" and "Kiss Land".
Arguments from musicians about drug use