Current mood:
blissful
Heres the 411 on those songs as I understood them,however some were written before i was born,so I might be a little shaky on a few of them.
REEFER MAN -CAB CALLOWAY -1940 (?) -ORIGINAL ARTIST ?
I would guess this has to be the earliest known marijuana song on record on a major record label,Im surprised the label released it!No PMRC back then I guess.If there were earlier versions of this song ,I still think its the first major label release !!
A big band arrangement ,predating rock and roll by decades.At the time(1940s) ,Im sure very few people knew what it was about ,the only people smoking weed back then were black jazz "cats"in New York City.
"Reefer" was among the earliest known slang terms for marijuana cigarrettes,dont know origin of it,and the "reefer man" was the pot connection(Malcom X was one)that sold to a few hip jazz music fans for 10 cents,yes ten cents a cigarrette (back in the 1940s)and brought the weed to the clubs for the musicians.
Damn clever lyrics for this song for those times ,when 99.9 % of the USA population didnt
know what reefer was !!!If there was an FCC back then,they must not have known either,I know it got radio airplay and was on many jukeboxes.
If anybody has more background on this song please post !
AMPHETAMINE ANNIE -CANNED HEAT Great song no matter what the lyrics are about ,didnt get much airplay on radio except for use in anti drug spots !! Back when you got REAL amphetamine pills(black beautys 335),so powerful you could break them open and snort them , from your local family dcotor for "diet" or "exhaustion"as easy as getting vitamins.Unforunatly too many people wound up hooked and abusing them and they were no longer allowed for anyone except severe narcolepsy.
This form of the drug was invented by German scientists in the late 1890s ,later into METHAMPHETAMINE by the Japanese before WW 2 .Hitler was given it in his B-12 shots .
This song was written about a girl Annie who couldnt handle Amphetamine.
high