stoner Beatles

Beatles Got High In Buckingham Palace?

The Beatles were renowned for their experiential music that was often heavily influenced by psychedelic drugs including cannabis. Song’s like ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’ and ‘With A Little Help From My Friends’ were said to be associated with marijuana. After being awarded an MBE, at Buckingham Palace in, 1965, rumour spread of The Beatles getting high there.

Who are The Beatles?

The Beatles were one of the most influential bands in music history. The British musical quartet and global focus were formed around the 1960s, starting with singer and guitarist  John Lennon and signer and bassist Paul McCartney, who first performed together in Liverpool, in 1957. 

The self-taught rock and roll musicians gathered George Harrison, in the same year and drummer, Ringo Starr, in 1961 – recommended by their label manager George Martin, at Parlophone.

The Beatles music varied from ballads, classical music, hard rock and rock and roll, across their album-releases. By 1962, their devoted fan-base was like no other, thanks to modern mass media creating one of the first collective frenzies.

After their belated first appearance on British television, in 1963, their  fame and support was coined by British newspapers as Beatlemania. In early 1964, the same phenomenon erupted in the United States.

the palace

Did The Beatles really get high at Buckingham Palace?

In the first five years of The Beatles, their rising fame brought a plethora of awards and titles, including Britains most prestigious accolad, an MBE (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire), recommended by British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, in 1965.

There was brief turmoil over its relevance to the band by The Beatles core fan base, including previous recipients and military veterans who stated it as lowering the dignity of the royal title.

There was a popular rumour that John Lennon had “smoked a joint” in the bathroom of Buckingham Palace before the award, to calm their nerves. The three other band members denied the claim and Harrison stated “we smoked a cigarette” 

the Beatles and the queen

“‘What happened was we were waiting to go through, standing in an enormous line with hundreds of people, and we were so nervous that we went to the toilet’, he said. ‘And in there we smoked a cigarette – we were all smokers in those days. Years later, I’m sure John was thinking back on remembering, “oh yes, we went in the toilet and smoked,” and it turned into a reefer. Because what could be the worst thing you could do before you meet the Queen? Smoke Aretha! But we never did.”

George Harrison

Anthology

At the time The Beatles were highly connected to being addicted to marijuana, especially during filming their second movie, Help!, in 1965. This film in what the band would describe as a “haze of marijuana” to a 1970 Rolling Stone interview, long lingered in the shadow of the previous year’s screen debuts A Hard Day’s Night.

“The Beatles had gone beyond comprehension. We were smoking marijuana for breakfast. We were well into marijuana and nobody could communicate with us, because we were just glazed eyes, giggling all the time.”

John Lennon

All We Are Saying, David Sheff

Director Richard Lester had to shoot the band members individually as they couldn’t remember their lines from being consistently high. 

“If you look at pictures of us you can see a lot of red-eyed shots; they were red from the drop we were smoking. And these were those clean-cut boys! Dick Lester knew that very little would get done after lunch. In the afternoon we seldom got past the first line of script. We had such hysterics that no one could do anything.”

Ringo Starr

Anthology

the smoker gang

Both the music industry and filming puts incredible pressure on artists and The Beatles were no exception. Marijuana became an escape and was used often to avoid the strains of the industry.

With this said, its highly debated that to supposed ‘cigarette’ that Harrison claimed they smoked at Buckingham Palace, was in fact marijuana.

Have The Beatles always smoked marijuana?

The Beatles, who went by “Silver Beatles” at the time, first encounter with marijuana was in 1960,  during their trip to Hamburg, to perform at its notorious Indra Club in the city’’s Reeperbahn red-light district. Initially they were unimpressed by cannabis until they met Bob Dylan four years later.

“We first got marijuana from an older drummer with another group in Liverpool. We didn’t actually try it until after we’d been to Hamburg. I remember  we smoked it in the band room in a gig in Southport and we all learn to do the Twist that nigh, which was popular at the time. We were all seeing if we could do it. Everybody was saying, “this stuff  isn’t doing anything.” It was like that old joke where a party is going on and two hippies are floating on the ceiling, and one is saying to the other “this stuff doesn’t work, man”

George Harrison

Anthology

In 1967, all four members, including the band manager Brian Epstein, supported an advertisement calling for the legislation of cannabis and the release of all people who were criminalised for possession and use of marijuana in medical research.

best music goes with best marijuana

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