On a High Note

by editor Michele Catalano

We will address this right up front: I am a stoner. I was a stoner in high school but quit weed all together when I turned twenty. I didn’t touch the stuff until four years ago, when my post-marriage breakup spiraling was happening. My daughter convinced me that smoking weed would help me, and damn it, she was right. It quiets the voices in my head. It soothes me. It makes the rest of this shitty world disappear for a little while. Weed got me through those early months, when I thought my life was over. 

Eventually, I healed emotionally, but ultimately decided that I quite enjoyed being high and would continue to partake. It’s a considerable part of my life now, and I regret nothing. It’s helping me enjoy the hell out of my retirement. At 62, I feel like anything you could tell me bad about pot would be wasted breath. Let me live my life.

That said, I have decided to celebrate 4/20, which is happening this weekend (on Easter), by telling you about the songs I listen to when I’m high. These are not songs about being high—you can find those lists at the usual places this weekend—but songs that go along with being high or are really interesting to listen to while stoned. 

I am always listening to music while high. Even if I am watching a baseball or hockey game, I put the game on mute while I listen to music. What I listen to depends on how high I am or what kind of high I am feeling. If I’ve eaten edibles (usually 20 mg of gummies), I lean toward prog rock or ‘80s metal. I’ll listen to “Heart of the Sunrise” by Yes and sing all the high parts without caring if the neighbors hear me. I’ll switch to Iron Maiden’s “Run to the Hills” and do the same. “I Believe in a Thing Called Love” by the Darkness also calls to me during these highs. 

Sometimes I will take a sleepy gummy and enter a state of musical bliss, one where Hum’s “Stars” makes me close my eyes and think about space or an 11-minute cover version of “Cortez the Killer” by Built to Spill (originally by Neil Young, whose version works as well) lulls me into a comfortable state of pre-slumber.

I mostly smoke, and there is music for the act of smoking, as well as music to listen to as the high hits. “Time” by Pink Floyd is perfect for filling the one-hitter and lighting up. Then it depends on what kind of high I have once the THC settles in. 

When I was in high school, I liked to smoke alone. I’d walk up to the elementary school after dinner and smoke there with the rest of the degenerates. Someone always had a portable cassette player(not quite a boom box), and they were almost always playing some Zeppelin album. And while “Dazed and Confused” is a great song to be stoned to, I really just wanted to be alone with my thoughts and my music. I’d smoke up, decline invitations to hang out and have a beer, and go home to the sanctity of my bedroom, with its Doors and Grateful Dead posters, with my stereo and albums that held all the pleasures of the world.

That’s when I began to associate getting high with listening to music. It was a tandem for me. I always wanted to have them hand in hand. Being high all the time wasn’t an option for a 14- or 16-year-old, but it was heaven when I was able to connect my two states of being. Sitting on my bedroom floor, grooving to Boston’s “Foreplay”—with my black light on and my brain sufficiently pandered to that I reached some kind of nirvana—was a near nightly experience for me. I regret nothing. 

Here I am, almost 50 years later, picking up the same habits I had when I was a teenager. The funny part is, I will still listen to “Dazed and Confused” and “Heart of the Sunrise” when I get one of those highs that has me wrapped up in a cocoon of nostalgia. I’ll search for ‘70s rock playlists on Apple Music and spend an evening eating Cheez-Its while I go down a rabbit hole of the best and worst of my youth. Catch me moving my head to “Grazing in the Grass” or “Strawberry Letter 23”—two songs that I believe were meant to be listened to while impaired by weed.

Sometimes I’ll get high enough to become very emotional, in a positive sort of way. I’ll get swept up in the music and lyrics and the way they flow together, and I’ll cry when it all comes together perfectly; “Farewell Transmission” by Songs:Ohia makes me weep. Jane’s Addiction’s “Three Days” takes me to a higher plane of existence, especially when the song soars and crashes. I want to cry at the sheer beauty of it all. And sometimes, if I smoke a lot—absentmindedly refilling the one-hitter and smoking away as if it were a Marlboro Menthol Light— I’ll get on the giddy side and look for songs that fit a good mood and can carry the weight of my wanting to groove while being happy. The Who’s “A Quick One While He’s Away,” Yo La Tengo’s “Cherry Chapstick,” and De la Soul’s “Magic Number” are songs I turn to when the mood or high is right. 

I think both experiences, getting stoned and listening to music, are wonderful on their own, but pairing them together lifts the fulfillment you get from each. Sometimes it takes me a song or two to find the right pairing, but once I get it right, I’m floating. And that’s a good feeling. And right now, at this particular time in our history, who couldn’t use some good feelings?

Happy 4/20 to those who celebrate. Party on.

Below is the Apple Music playlist I listen to sometimes when I partake.