The High Times Reader

This book contains some of the most popular High Times articles ever published and effectively demonstrates that High Times is much more than a publication about drugs. I personally really enjoyed the Richard Pryor story. This book will not disappoint you.

As it turns out High Times is (or at least was) more than an assortment of budshots and hydro ads. This book is a FASCINATING collection of articles, essays, and interviews detailing the impact and spread of pscyotropic substances upon contemporary culture and it's figures. This book is a must for anyone wanting an intimate look at how mind altering substances made their way into popular society. This book names names left and right. The most interesting article is a history of how LSD and cannabis became popular in a very micro sense. The article doesn't just talk about Albert Hoffman's bike ride, it tells the story of how LSD made it's way from Sandoz, how a guy named Owlsey became the prime producer for all of the acid consumers in the mid 60s, the celebrities he shared it with, the celebrities those celebrities shared it with, and the celebrities those celebrities shared it with. Wanna know who turned on the Beatles? Wanna read about all the coke politicians did? Wanna read about Hunter S Thompson? Abbie Hoffman? Taking acid in Golden Gate Park? Wanna read about Bob Marley talking about his acid tester and how hard it is to find good bud? Wanna read about how JFK got his weed? Wanna read about the dark side of Walt Disney? Wanna read about taking DMT in the jungle with shamans? These are just the topics my stoner brain can remember, there were many more (I lost the book months ago, but I'm buying another). The High Times reader is a valuable book because it doesn't present drug culture in a mythical fashion. There is a very authentic quality to it. The writing was done by the counterculture, for the counterculture, during the height of the counterculture, by people who lived the counterculture. This book provides an intimate look at drugs and the counter-culture that isn't available anywhere else. I cringe to think that most of the information contained within is already forgotten, and as a result of High Times's reputation will probably never be remembered. I thought I knew the history of drugs, but what I knew was the history of drugs as told by The Man. This totally changed my perspective of the last 50 years. I wasn't old enough to experience the countercoulter, and my attempts to understand it didn't paint the whole picture (reading the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, PiHKAL/TiKHAL, watching The Weathermen Underground, Woodstock), but it was this unsuspecting book, the book I had no hopes for, that eventually put the finishes touches on the canvas of the past bringing it to life.