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Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland was arrested buying heroin while dressed as a pimp. Red Hot Chili Peppers lost two guitarists in a row to heroin. Ozzy Osbourne locked himself in a hotel room for three months to binge on drugs and alcohol after he was fired from Black Sabbath. Travis Barker’s addiction to prescription drugs following a plane crash nearly killed him, multiple times. These stories are far too common in rock and roll, and music at large.
But one rock star who always lived above the influence in an industry where hedonism reigns supreme is KORN’s drummer Ray Luzier. Speaking with The You Rock Foundation during KORN’s summer 2017 tour, the 47-year-old revealed how he was able to steer clear of destructive tendencies while many of his friends relied on them.
Via Blabbermouth:
“[Early on in my career] I went to Los Angeles to go to a music school, and right away when I went to the music school, I saw a lot of drugs and I saw a lot of pot and I saw a lot of people just there for the wrong reasons,” Ray said. “And I’ve always been there for a hundred percent music; I wanted to better my craft, I wanted to get better at playing. So I decided, every time I’d go to a party and I’d see people partaking in these actions, in these activities, I decided not to do it, because I saw the repercussions — I saw the next day how hung over they’d be — and, to me, it wasn’t fun.
“I was the geek that was going to the practice lab and practicing and getting better at my instrument,” he continued. “And I just made that decision at a very young age that… I saw what it did to people and I saw a lot of divorces from my friends, I saw a lot of bands break up, I saw a lot of bank accounts being drained — a lot of really bad things because of substance [abuse]. So I’m one of the few rock and rollers that’s a lifer — and I will be doing this till the day I die — that has never taken a drug. And only for that reason, I saw what it did to other people.
“I have a very addictive personality, and, to be honest, I’d probably love [laughs] a lot of the things out there, a lot of the bad things out there,” he admitted. “So my whole theory has always been: if you don’t start it, you don’t have to stop it. And that, to me, is a very important thing. That has to do with cigarettes, pot, drugs, anything that’s not good for your body. That was my whole theory, and I still live by it to this day. So anyone out there that’s maybe hasn’t tried anything that’s thinking about, I’m living proof that you can be around shady situations or maybe not the most healthiest situations and you can still say ‘no’ and you can still get away from it and live your life and be even happier.
“To me, music has always… My whole thing was no drug would ever take you any higher than music, and that’s something that I clearly believe in. Because when I go to a concert or if I put my favorite record on, the feeling that I get and the emotions that I get, no drug or no substance or no artificial substance is ever gonna take that place.”
This dude needs to be featured in an Above The Influence commercial ASAP.
[h/t Blabbermouth]