Modern music glorifies drug use in a harmful way

Steven Polanco,
Contributor

Many modern musicians use lyrics that may influence listeners to participate in drug use. Not all music contains these types of lyrics, the most common genres include pop and rap. Even though a lot of people listen to it and find it the most popular, it does not mean it is the best influence on kids and young adults.

In the music of previous generations, artists created lyrics that would describe their experience and emotional state while intoxicated but the current generation creates lyrics that describe the physical act of taking drugs.

While drugs have been an important factor in the music industry for creating new sounds and styles, I believe that rather than talking about using drugs, it is better to write about what you saw or how you felt.

For example, hallucinogenic drugs heavily influenced the Beatles. The songs “Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds” and “Day Tripper” are some of their most popular songs that were influenced by LSD. Even Paul McCartney admitted they were influenced by drugs speaking with USA Today.

“Day Tripper, that’s one about acid. ‘Lucy in the Sky,’ that’s pretty obvious,” McCartney told USA Today. “There’s others that make subtle hints about drugs, but, you know, it’s easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles’ music.”

An excerpt from “Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds” shows the manner in which the Beatles wrote these songs with descriptions like “Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain, where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies, everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers, that grow so incredibly high.”

These lyrics are very obviously inspired by what The Beatles were seeing or feeling while under the influence, rather than by the act of taking the drug like many modern musicians do today.

While in the song “Molly” by Tyga, featuring Wiz Khalifa & Mally Mall, he specifically sings about how he is looking for Molly, which is a type of drug. With lyrics like, “I’ve been searchin’ everywhere and I can’t seem to find, Molly, Molly, Molly, Molly … like ‘where the f— that Molly?’ OD we’re OG’s … my bank account is enormous, weed so loud it’s distorted, got champagne and we pourin’ it, she poppin’ it and she snortin’ it.”

These lines are all a part of the same song that is talking about drugs and overdosing. Lyrics like these could heavily influence teenagers to take a variety of drugs and lead them to overdose.

Another example of a song that was written where it doesn’t talk about drugs, but was heavily influenced by it was “The Stars That Play With Laughing Sam’s Dice” by Jimi Hendrix. “The milky way express is loaded all aboard, I promise each and every one of you you won’t be bored, what I’m really concerned about, is my grand-new pair of butterfly roller skates, thank you, thank you,” the song expresses.

Hendrix was highly influenced by LSD, but never actually talked about it in his lyrics. Again, he just described what he saw.

Another song in modern music that talks about drugs is “Unnecessary” by Childish Gambino, featuring Schoolboy Q & Ab-Soul. In this song, Childish Gambino specifically talks about popping Molly with Miley and how she takes shrooms, which is another popular drug.

“She driving stick in the driveway, just popped a Molly with Miley, she do shrooms every blue moon,” the song describes.

I asked five people between the ages of 18 and 22 if they felt lyrics in the current generation of music were too explicit and a bad influence on on young people. They all felt that this was true and believed that the older generation’s music was better. Artists are promoting drug abuse in a very negative way and they don’t understand the kind of damage it is doing to children and young adults with their harmful lyrics.

While the older generations of musicians never specifically stated the kinds of drugs they were taking, the lyrics themselves were harmless. They would write about experiencing a high rather than promoting it. The lyrics of modern music are very explicit in the sense that they promote drug use in a negative way.

The reason why music has changed so much over the previous century is because the media has changed and how people consume it. Before, it was the very best artists whose content would be heard, now anyone can do this in their bedroom with a computer and then just upload it to YouTube.

Hopefully one day, music can became what it used to be, when lyrics weren’t a negative influence on kids and young adults, when lyrics were about the experience and a feeling.