King Heroin

Heroin use has been on an epidemic rise in the United States for over a decade.  I once heard its effects being described as feeling on vacation, lying on the most blissful sea breezed beach, having the most intense orgasm of your life. Of Your LIFE!

I was introduced to the James Brown single "King Heroin" by my older brother in the 1970's, a decade that saw drug use and abuse reach record proportions. James Brown might not have been the most drug-free musician to sing an anti-drug song, but how he sang it made the message loud and clear to many of that generation; 
"Get your mind together and Get Away From Drugs."

Here we are forty-three years since Polydor Records released what would reach number six on the Hot Soul Singles chart; and still many of our young people are getting tripped up and turned out learning too late just why Heroin is King.  You don't really need a soulful song to highlight the dangers of Heroin, just find a nodding junkie with vomit-crusted lips after his morning taste and watch, and learn. 

Wonder why they call it Smack? Because it simply smacks you senseless to any and everything in your environment. You have no control over body or mind. You are at that moment of impact a zombie, barely able to stand, much less walk. Bodily fluids may seep, thoughts of any kind cease to materialize. You're as far away from family, friends and loved ones as a space shuttle launched into orbit. And your alone with no guarantee of return.

Sure there are bad environments in our world, but escape through drugs is no escape at all; its condemning yourself to one of the worse hell's on earth. You lose everything. And the sadness of it all is that those addicts who overdose and don't wake up are considered by some to be the lucky ones. To hear fellow addicts tell it, they're somewhere making love, enjoying the sea breeze. In reality they're just dead!

Lyrics to King Heroin

Ladies and Gentlemen

Fellow Americans

Lady Americans

This is James Brown

I wanna talk to you about one of our

Most deadly

Killers in the country today

I had a dream the other night, and I

Was sittin' in my living room

Dozed off to sleep

So I start to dreamin'

I dreamed I walked in a place and

I saw a real strange, weird object

Standin' up talkin' to the people

And I found out it was Heroin

That deadly drug that go in your veins

He says:

I came to this country without a passport

Ever since then I've been hunted and sought

My little white grains are nothin' but waste

Soft and deadly and bitter to taste

I'm a world of power and all know it's true

Use me once and you'll know it, too

I can make a mere schoolboy forget his books

I can make a world-famous beauty neglect her looks

I can make a good man forsake his wife

Send a greedy man to prison for the rest of his life

I can make a man forsake his country and flag

Make a girl sell her body for a five-dollar bag

Some think my adventure's a joy and a thrill

But I'll put a gun in your hand and make you kill

In cellophane bags I've found my way

To heads of state and children at play

I'm financed in China, ran in Japan

I'm respected in Turkey and I'm legal in Siam

I take my addicts and make 'em steal, borrow, beg

Then they search for a vein in their arm or their leg

So, be you Italian, Jewish, Black or Mex

I can make the most virile of men forget their sex

So now, no, my man, you must (you know) do your best

To keep up your habit until your arrest

Now the police have taken you from under my wing

Do you think they dare defy me, I who am king'

Now, you must lie in that county jail

Where I can't get to you by visit or mail

So squirm -- with discomfort -- wiggle and cough (hack!)

Six days of madness, hah! You might throw me off

Curse me in name! Defy me in speech!

But you'd pick me up right now if I were in your reach

All through your sentence you've become resolved to your fate

Hear now! younng man and woman, I'll be waitin' at the gate

Don't be afraid, don't run! I'm not chased

Sure my name is Heroin! You'll be back for a taste

Behold, you're hooked!

Your foot is in the stirrup

And make -- haste!

Mount the steed!

And ride him well

For the white horse of heroin

Will ride you to Hell!

To Hell!

Will ride you to Hell!

Until you are dead!

Dead, brother! Dead!

This is a revolution of the mind

Get your mind together

And get away from drugs!

That's the man!

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