Early Jamaican immigrants in 1920’s New Orleans were in distinct cultural districts such as Storyville, where jazz music was born. These areas where musicians thrived is also the place in which cannabis found its roots in southern American life.
Relationship Between Cannabis and Jazz Musicians
Cannabis served as a tool for many early jazz artists, including Louis Armstrong. They used marijuana for its perceived “time-slowing” effect, allowing them to let go, relax, and experiment with different improvised riffs very creatively during a jam session. Daniel Levitin said that the effect of cannabis, it disrupts short-term memory enabling musicians to truly live in the moment and connect with with each note played. Even while cannabis started to be prosecuted in the public eye, jazz artists began to use slang terms in order to sing its praise. Many of these terms can still be heard today like “Reefer”, “Jive”, “Viper”, and “Mighty Mezz”. Each with its own meaning, reefer and jive are interchangeable with just weed. Whereas a “viper” is someone who smokes a lot of weed, named after the hissing sound from the burning joint. The most similar to our “that's pressure/gas” expression they had “Mighty Mezz” which was synonymous with a particular dealer's weed which was the best at the time.
Harry J. Anslinger
Ran a disinformation campaign on cannabis and the jazz musicians it influenced. Stating these musicians and their music were “satanic” in their being. That the black musicians were hypnotizing young white women with the sounds of jazz and the smoking of reefer. Anslinger claimed that smoking weed “made darkies think they’re as good as white men.” He wanted to rid the black pride with the musicians. Louis Armstrong was a prominent “viper” even being arrested outside a jazz club while smoking a joint with the drummer in Los Angeles.
“We always looked at pot as a sort of medicine, a cheap drunk and with much better thoughts than one that's filled of liquor”
- Louis Armstrong
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