Peace, family.

Man, that movie "Detroit" affected me deeply. Especially that character from Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes.

Anyway, does anybody have any anecdotes or crazy stories from or about these cats. In the 70's, musicians were wild as Hell. I just wanna know what they got up to behind-the-scenes.

So, share.

 

Oops, the character in "Detroit" is actually from The Dramatics.

Nevertheless, I wanna hear about Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes and their wild sex and drug stories.

 

Here's a New York Times article from 1983:

http://www.nytimes.com/1983/08/09/nyregion/the-region-singer-arrested-on-drug-charges.html

THE REGION
THE REGION; Singer Arrested On Drug
Charges
UPI
Published: August 9, 1983
ATLANTIC CITY, Aug. 8— Harold Melvin,
the soul singer, and three members of his Blue
Notes Band and six others were arrested on drug
charges Sunday at Caesars Boardwalk Regency
Hotel Casino, the police said today.

A maid was said to have discovered more than
90 grams of cocaine, and fewer than 25 grams
of marijuana, 100 grams of methamphetamines,
drug paraphernalia and a .32-caliber handgun
were also found in a search.

Mr. Melvin, 44 years old, of Philadelphia, was
freed on $25,000 bail. Bail was set at $22,000
for the band members, Cornell Grant, 25; Rufus
Thorne, 31, and George Prettyman, 35, all of
Philadelphia.

 

I wonder how they got such tiny bail in the 1980's for dealer quantities of coke, meth and the .32...I guess that the gun wasn't loaded.

 

90 grams of cocaine is about reasonable for five people. Don't you think?

 

Which five people. I've seen some go through a gramm a night. I personally have died a horrible death both times I snorted it, it was not my kind of buzz In my time was more a tequilla and weed kinda guy. I journeyed maybe 50 times on peyote though. Inward for me churned my creativity. Cocaine kills the soul, peyote with intention nurtures it.

 

What is peyote?

Wait...what? Hold on! Start over. You died? Explain.

 

No, LOL, but it felt that way. For me it felt like the deathly squeeze of a boa constrictor choking the life out of me. Clenched jawed and waiting for some horrible end I just knew to be lurking behind every extended moment in exaggerated time is not what I would call a good time. The second and last time I partook was when visiting a friend in his condo high-rise in San Diego. We hadn't seen each other in a good long while, and so in celebration he put out a long wide line on his mirrored living room table. I was young and foolish and didn't want him to think of me as a lightweight, and so ripped through it in two great and lightening fast snorts through a $1,000 bill that he kept for such occasions. What he didn't tell me was that it was pharmaceutical grade and barely cut at all. My nasal membranes felt as though slashed by a million tiny, razor wielding madmen and my pulse began to climb. I was scared to death that my heart was going to give out. I remember reading my pulse, counting off the 15 seconds that I figured would be a significant time to tally a good count, my heart was beating at 180 bpm. My hands gripped the wooden arm rest of the carved oak chair in a death grip, feeling that I need anchor myself to something, anything lest my soul be forcibly ripped from my now solid chunk of human flesh. My shirt was soaked through and I thought that I was going to die there in San Diego before I got to visit Maui for the first time. About that moment my friend casually mentioned that the high-rise condo was actually built within 100 yards from the San Andreas Fault, a major earthquake rift in southern California. I was now certain of my life would end in an explosion eliminating from behind my sternum and that my parents, family and everyone I knew would hold this notion of me as their last memory of my life.

Cocaine, running through my veins.

 

HAHAHA! Drugs are bad, bro.

 

peyotil

 

payola

 

Sounds like you had some good shit!