the first time I took acid
I was in my first year at Manchester University and I dropped a tab with a friend who was going on to a party. It started enjoyably enough, sitting in the student bar giggling uncontrollably. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that I had agreed to go to an all-night film festival with another of my flatmates (who I hardly knew) and his girlfriend.

They showed up in the bar and due to my mental state I did not dare tell them that I had taken acid and could not be persuaded my friend to come to the party. So instead I spent the entire night tripping off my noodle in a darkened room with a bunch of strangers sitting through four films (including Child's Play) feeling unbelievably paranoid. The next day, having not slept at all, I was still tripping when my Dad came to take me back home for the weekend. Somehow I got away with it.

The next time, a few weeks later, myself and seven of my eight flatmates had decided to enter a battle of the bands competition, despite the fact that only a handful of us were vaguely musical. Three of us put together a set of Beatles covers and called ourselves the Beatless (geddit).

Shortly before going onstage, my friend (the bass player) informed me that he had dropped a tab. Thinking 'what the hell' the singer and myself (playing guitar) did the same. We were the only three that knew the set. The drummer had never sat in front of a drumkit before stepping on stage. The other singer forgot the words to Yellow Submarine. God only knows what we all sounded like.

My abiding memory is of two people walking to the front of the stage during our set and doing a synchronised faint in front of us.

We came second.
(stone the crows, Thu 15 Dec 2005, 15:26, Reply)