America's New Drug of Choice

Crystal Meth is the new drug of choice even among sophisticated business people because it is essentially speed, so it heightens your senses and keeps you a
wake and alert for long periods of time. I read an article not long ago about factories in Texas in which the managers/supervisors knew that the workers were using meth but they didn’t do anything about it. Consider the long term effects of crystal meth: highly addictive, destroys a person’s appetite, literally ages you and sucks the life out of you, causes tooth and hair loss, very difficult to break the habit. It is an addiction that totally owns you.

During 2009 I stumbled upon a band from Athens that I had heard of before but never bothered to listen to, Drive By Truckers. Although I only have the one disc, they quickly found their way to upper echelon of my listening preferences. The music they create is beautiful and dark at the same time! They have an uncanny ability to name the ordinary, common elements of life and expose them for what they are or are not when you look below the surface. They are not people of faith, as best I can tell, but the lyrics are definitely influenced by some religious exposure along the way. It's interesting that it doesn't take a Christian to point out the problems with substance abuse.

YOU AND YOUR CRYSTAL METH

You’ve become such a mess. You and your crystal meth You lost your family and wrecked your truck, I used to love you but now you suck We were friends, among the best; You and your crystal meth I ain’t exactly a no-drug guy, Don’t dig the way that you get high Hope your kids don’t see you throwing up, Hope they ain’t there if the house blows up Hope you ain’t murdered in your sleep, Up all night with that cranked out creep You ain’t eaten and you ain’t slept; You and your crystal meth Indiana and Alabama, Oklahoma and Arizona. Texas, Florida, Ohio, Small town America, right next door Blood soaked your pillow red; You and your crystal meth

Patterson Hood / Hood, Neff, Cooley and David Barbe © Razor and Tie Music (BMI)