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drone007
04-25-2006, 11:45 AM
OK guys, here's my rundown. Obviously we all know there is LSD or DMT or some kind of psychoactive drug. We all know basically what the lyrics consist of, but I have only really seen some jumbled theories about this song.

First of all, it starts off with a doctor and nurse talking about a patient that came in mysteriously and is very detached from reality. Blah blah blah, we finally get to hear the patient's words/thoughts:

However, I think there the interesting idea about this song that I have not seen touched upon is the idea that the patient was given LSD without knowing. LSD has been used in military testing as a kind of truth syrum or in the hopes of being a "specific emotion" trigger in order to more readily prepare spies and operatives for the types of mental breakdowns they might encounter. My reasoning to assume the patient is a subject of this testing is as follows:

via wikipedia.org

"LSD was the original centerpiece of the United States Central Intelligence Agency's top secret MK-ULTRA project, an ambitious undertaking conducted from the 1950s through the 1970s designed to explore the possibilities of pharmaceutical mind control. Hundreds of participants, including CIA agents, government employees, military personnel, prostitutes, members of the general public, and mental patients were given LSD, many without their knowledge or consent. The experiments often involved severe psychological torture, and many victims committed suicide or wound up in psychiatric wards. The researchers eventually concluded that LSD's effects were too varied and uncontrollable to make it of any practical use as a truth drug, and the project moved on to other substances. It would be decades before the US government admitted the existence of the project and offered apologies to the families of those who had died during the experiments. See MK-ULTRA."


via the interpretted lyrics:

"this shit never happens to me"
"E.T. gave me orange peels" etc.
"i didn't graduate high school"
"goddamn, shit the bed" - slang for screwing something up (via wikipedia.org)

anybody ever actually watched the X-files? In one episode two people are abducted by aliens, and one of the aliens is shown to be smoking a cigarette. turns out that the aliens were governmental humans that were dressed up as aliens. the lyrics quoted above tell me that this is just some normal fuckup guy who got chosen for testing.


via wikipedia.org re: Dr. Hoffman's first large trip on LSD-25:


"Three days later, on April 19, 1943 (known as Bicycle Day), Dr. Hofmann intentionally ingested 250 µg of LSD, which he hypothesized would be a threshold dose, based on other ergot alkaloids. In reality the threshold is 25 µg. Hoffman wrote:

By now it was already clear to me that LSD had been the cause of the remarkable experience of the previous Friday, for the altered perceptions were of the same type as before, only much more intense. I had to struggle to speak intelligibly. I asked my laboratory assistant, who was informed of the self-experiment, to escort me home. We went by bicycle, no automobile being available because of wartime restrictions on their use. On the way home, my condition began to assume threatening forms. Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror. I also had the sensation of being unable to move from the spot. Nevertheless, my assistant later told me we had traveled very rapidly.

Dr. Hofmann summoned a doctor, who could find no abnormal physical symptoms other than extremely dilated pupils. After spending several hours terrified that his body had been possessed by a demon, that his next door neighbor was a witch, and that his furniture was threatening him, Dr. Hofmann feared he had become completely insane."

Hoffman's trip and subsequent study into LSD may be why we are told to "blame hoffman."


Anyway, I don't feel like typing/pasting more so my basic analysis of the song is that the patient did NOT willingly take LSD. It reminds me of a normal guy who gets drawn into this situation without knowing he's been put under the influence. Hofmann himself didn't understand it even after he gave it to himself.

And to say that E.T. gave you orange slices is a bit odd, other than to say that E.T. is just what the dude assumed that the humans were when he was tripping.

That's my story, and personally I'm sticking to it. Sorry if this is common knowledge or something, but I haven't seen any threads that point this difference out. :/

P.S. "Army or E.T. TESTS ON DAVE" perhaps?

slicknickshady
04-25-2006, 12:22 PM
probably.

Tantobourne
04-25-2006, 12:34 PM
my first listen to the lyrics last night brought up this angle...

blair and his buddies often talk about trips to area 51 with his silver coleman blah-de-blah....

imagine mjk or the likes on one of those amusement rides out into the desert to seek out the infamous area 51 known for its supposed ufo testing and aliens. perhaps out of boredom and daydreaming about the whole art-bell/conspiracy theory concept he goes off on a tangent thought about aliens.

also consider that he's fucked up (or perhaps not 'he' but a theoretical third-person going to area 51) on some hallucinogenic drug and while high ends up mixing the myth of area51/aliens into his trip at which point he begins to imagine that he has been abducted, told he was the 'savior' and experimented on.

the rest of the lyrics read to me like i'm watching 'fear and loathing in las vegas' and it's all first-person, trying to track all the bizarre occurances of the drug trip and sort out the 'real' from the 'trip'.

i actually found it pretty funny once i got the bulk of the lyrics digested. some of my hallucinogenic trips ran the same gamut of crazy thoughts that the lyrics suggest.

it's kind of a fun song as a whole, reminiscent of the 'third-eye' drug trip but with less seriousness. the technical play on the vocals is pretty cool and adds to the disorientation of the event.

so yah...meep....

drone007
04-25-2006, 04:22 PM
thanks for the reply. don't you think it's a little odd that someone who apparently trips often would think that an E.T. gave him orange slices? I've never done it, but if you are experienced enough, wouldn't you have that much of a grip on reality? It seems most likely to me that this guy doesn't know he's high. He thinks he's goin crazy.


I woulda thought there'd be more responses to this. maybe it's just not that interesting of an idea. :) Personally, I think it's amazing that they testing LSD on people without them knowing. That's fucked up to all hell... on mentally retarded people, too! I hope some people got their due karma for that shit.

praefector
04-25-2006, 04:35 PM
apparently no one here has ever done too much acid/dmt-amt

im not sure how you could determine he was given the drug unwillingly since the storytelling part of the song is a flashback.

were assuming from what lost keys gives us that a stupified man wanders into a hospital with no intention of speaking to anyone. this makes sense as hes just had a very intense trip and is now trying desperately to remember the information he was told.

i cant find anything in the song to make me believe he was unwillingly dosed other than the onset of hysteria and eventually catatonia (am i alive? am i dead?) -- but even so it is possible to trip out for days or weeks and have no recollection of ever ingesting anything.

the part that makes me feel his dosing was intentional is "finally its my lucky day" and "cuz this shit never happens to me". both of these lines, and to an extend the "sunkist and sudafed" line, make me believe that this guy had experimented with many different doses of hallucinagenic drugs prior to his epic-trip.

insaner
04-25-2006, 06:02 PM
OK guys, here's my rundown. Obviously we all know there is LSD or DMT or some kind of psychoactive drug. We all know basically what the lyrics consist of, but I have only really seen some jumbled theories about this song.

First of all, it starts off with a doctor and nurse talking about a patient that came in mysteriously and is very detached from reality. Blah blah blah, we finally get to hear the patient's words/thoughts:

However, I think there the interesting idea about this song that I have not seen touched upon is the idea that the patient was given LSD without knowing. LSD has been used in military testing as a kind of truth syrum or in the hopes of being a "specific emotion" trigger in order to more readily prepare spies and operatives for the types of mental breakdowns they might encounter. My reasoning to assume the patient is a subject of this testing is as follows:



dmt was also tested on schizophrenics in the 50's. and it wasnt even secret i dont think.

ArizonaBay
04-25-2006, 06:07 PM
Sunkist? This may be a reference to a famous (and completely false) piece of LSD folklaw whereby a man on LSD permanently believes that he is a glass of orange juice and live the rest of his life terrified of being poured

optimistic-pessimist
04-25-2006, 07:19 PM
I think that's an interesting take on it drone. Honestly, I don't think there's any way to know for sure what "happened" in the context of the song. Definitely seems like there were drugs involved. Maybe he took them intentionally, maybe not. Maybe he was abducted, maybe it was the military, or maybe it was all in his head. I don't think we're meant to know. But yours is a good idea, nonetheless.

noahfor
04-25-2006, 07:59 PM
maybe the song is just supposed to be some ironic comedy. it's funny, and maybe that's it.

i'm pretty sure every psychedelic has the potential to create a trip of the intensity described in the song. considering it's happened to me from taking both shrooms and LSA (which most people don't even think is powerful enough to make you trip).

seneca77
04-25-2006, 08:27 PM
Sunkist? This may be a reference to a famous (and completely false) piece of LSD folklaw whereby a man on LSD permanently believes that he is a glass of orange juice and live the rest of his life terrified of being poured

i think the sunkist and sudafed line are speaking of additives people use while on LSD

optimistic-pessimist
04-25-2006, 09:17 PM
i think the sunkist and sudafed line are speaking of additives people use while on LSD

And some think that they're just things that he would be given in the hospital (or mental instituation.)

lucydog
04-25-2006, 09:30 PM
anyone who wears birkenstocks will KNOW when they have been given LSD.

hes a hippie burnout. his destiny was revealed to him - to write our fate - but since he was high, and had no pen, we will never know. noone will believe him, oh hes just an acid freak. you hallucinated it all.

edit: the aliens calmed him down with orange slices. but the sunkist, sudafed aret helping. and how do we know hes not in a detox unit? maybe thats what "blame hoffman" is- they think hes just spun, they are blaming the acid on why this guy is crazy

praefector
04-25-2006, 11:21 PM
i think the sunkist and sudafed line are speaking of additives people use while on LSD

no

its an acid hangover cure (sudafed to relax the respiratory system and alleviate the back pain caused by strychnine and sunkist because vitamin C helps your brain recover)

boondie
04-26-2006, 01:27 AM
no

its an acid hangover cure (sudafed to relax the respiratory system and alleviate the back pain caused by strychnine and sunkist because vitamin C helps your brain recover)
strychnine? hahahhahah

neurosis79
04-26-2006, 04:23 AM
anyone who wears birkenstocks will KNOW when they have been given LSD.

hes a hippie burnout. his destiny was revealed to him - to write our fate - but since he was high, and had no pen, we will never know. noone will believe him, oh hes just an acid freak. you hallucinated it all.

edit: the aliens calmed him down with orange slices. but the sunkist, sudafed aret helping. and how do we know hes not in a detox unit? maybe thats what "blame hoffman" is- they think hes just spun, they are blaming the acid on why this guy is crazy


yup he got the key to life from aliens but where probably too fucked up (lost keys,blame hofmann=maker of lcd)

insaner
04-26-2006, 06:28 AM
no

its an acid hangover cure (sudafed to relax the respiratory system and alleviate the back pain caused by strychnine and sunkist because vitamin C helps your brain recover)


both of those are myths. there is no strychnine in lsd.

visionary
04-26-2006, 07:23 AM
maybe the song is just supposed to be some ironic comedy. it's funny, and maybe that's it.

i'm pretty sure every psychedelic has the potential to create a trip of the intensity described in the song. considering it's happened to me from taking both shrooms and LSA (which most people don't even think is powerful enough to make you trip).

I am 100% with you on this idea. I just posted something in the lyrics thread to the same effect. I think Maynard is just entertaining the masses with a story of his own. A black comedy. The thing I love the most about this is when I am analyzing Tool lyrics, I always find myself imagining what Maynard imagines us concluding when interpreting his work. This is a classic example.

dancingflame
04-26-2006, 07:41 AM
someone I once met and who was also taking LSD for a long time told me (he was very much into crowley or RAW- stuff..he gave me the Leary-Biography, 2 books by Castaneda, Leary`s Exo-psychology and other stuff to read) that he on a ketamine-trip had the feeling of the greys (the aliens) being around...strange...
well, I am not so much in all that conspiracy telling going around...its very funny and very serious and I believe that some people have the right personal shape to become attracted by such things in a strange way they cannot bring into one with their every-day life...and maybe some day some trip may knock you out if you`re not strong enough...blabla...peace!
p.s: so my point is the guy drifted away on LSD somehow or maybe something even stronger...

praefector
04-26-2006, 08:40 AM
both of those are myths. there is no strychnine in lsd.

yeah

hence the "won't help"

and there is strych on some blotter...or something else that kills my back when i do blotter...i wasnt suggesting it was part of the chemical

gels or vile > obviously

optimistic-pessimist
04-26-2006, 08:55 AM
He knows he took something...

"Gotta be Deadhead chemistry.... got me seeing E motherfucking T"

Deadhead... the Grateful Dead... hippies... psychodelic drugs...

It's right there.

insaner
04-26-2006, 02:15 PM
yeah

hence the "won't help"

and there is strych on some blotter...or something else that kills my back when i do blotter...i wasnt suggesting it was part of the chemical

gels or vile > obviously


well its soemthing else. mainly a side effect of all hallucinogens that affect the indole ring.


and its vial.

smeefsmeef
04-26-2006, 03:36 PM
Great post. I had no idea who Hoffman was.

I know--at least in Oakland County, MI-- that Vitamin C is used quite a bit in conjunction with "shrooms."

Maybe the mention of Orange Peels and Sunkist has something to do w/ it....

rocco
04-26-2006, 09:32 PM
someone I once met and who was also taking LSD for a long time told me (he was very much into crowley or RAW- stuff..he gave me the Leary-Biography, 2 books by Castaneda, Leary`s Exo-psychology and other stuff to read) that he on a ketamine-trip had the feeling of the greys (the aliens) being around...strange...
well, I am not so much in all that conspiracy telling going around...its very funny and very serious and I believe that some people have the right personal shape to become attracted by such things in a strange way they cannot bring into one with their every-day life...and maybe some day some trip may knock you out if you`re not strong enough...blabla...peace!
p.s: so my point is the guy drifted away on LSD somehow or maybe something even stronger...

For anyone who's ever read the book on the drug era Storming Heaven, they talk about the common trope of hallucinating a little being, while on ketamine, who answers you when you talk to it. Whether the guy you met did or not, I can't say.

praefector
04-26-2006, 11:06 PM
well its soemthing else. mainly a side effect of all hallucinogens that affect the indole ring.


and its vial.

oh piss off you knew exactly what i meant

and it's "something"

; )

yossaricat
04-26-2006, 11:21 PM
[QUOTE=praefector]no

acid hangover cure = sleep ;p

praefector
04-26-2006, 11:28 PM
haha, true

my personal post-trip hangover cure is a 10-15 minute jog, some fruit, and a shower

usually after that im ready to work or whatever i have to do with no problems

doctorossi
04-27-2006, 09:28 AM
Maynard Keenan + 2 newly-evolved chromosomes = MK-ULTRA!

:)

insaner
04-28-2006, 05:11 AM
oh piss off you knew exactly what i meant

and it's "something"

; )


DOH!