Re: Serious discussion about pot & looping/music

[Geoff Smith <geoff.smith15@btopenworld.com>]

Just out of curiousity where is the brain stem?
I have never heard this term before.
Geoff
on 23/5/03 3:09 pm, Richard Zvonar at zvonar@zvonar.com wrote:

> At 12:16 PM +0200 5/23/03, Stuart Wyatt wrote:
>> I would be very interested to share my ideas about pot and music,
>> and would be very interested to hear other people's experiences on
>> the subject.
> 
> Speaking only for my personal experience with marijuana and music, I
> found that getting moderately stoned would facilitate a certain state
> of awareness that was useful for composing. I found it easy to "relax
> into" a focus on the sound of the music and the act of playing, and I
> found that in some ways my creativity seemed to be enhanced. I
> wouldn't say that "pot makes you more creative," but that relaxation
> and focus certainly do.
> 
> Before I ever got into playing while stoned I made a regular practice
> of listening while stoned. In these situations the effects were even
> more pronounced and included an increase in visualization of the
> music. Without the necessity of performing I could relax more deeply
> and place more of my awareness on following the details of the sound
> and in "mapping" the sounds to an internal visual "score."
> 
> I did not find that getting stoned and playing with other people was
> such a great success. Unfortunately, I am one of those for whom
> marijuana (particularly certain "heavier" varieties such as
> Columbian) leads to self-consciousness even unto paranoia. I also
> believe that getting stoned can foster an inflated sense of
> significance, so that one's creations seem at the time to be more
> brilliant than they do in retrospect. This could spell trouble in a
> performance situation, and in my bands we always made it a rule not
> to smoke until after the gig. The same thing went for drinking
> alcohol, though we were more relaxed about that.
> 
> I've also noticed some interesting effects while playing while stoned
> on LSD, though I did that only once. I felt that my awareness
> extended into other parts of my nervous system, beyond the cerebral
> cortex. In particular, while playing, I felt conscious of activity in
> my brain stem. I practiced Harrison's "Here Comes the Sun" while in
> this state and was impressed by how well this psychedelic rehearsal
> "took" and showed lasting results.
> 
> Interestingly, my guitar teacher would also stress the importance of
> focusing awareness on the brain stem while practicing - he told me
> this about a year after my LSD experience, and without my telling him
> about it.