The Art of Divine Inebriation Part I
An Interview with Gwyllm Llwydd.. Interviewed by Ronnie Pontiac
An Interview from a few years back… Part 1 of 2. I hope you enjoy!
Introduction:
When Gwyllm Llwydd was a boy a first offense marijuana possession carried a minimum sentence of two to ten years with a fine of up to 20,000 dollars – around 500,000 dollars today. Few could have imagined that in 2018 an adult would be able to stroll into a shop on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles and browse a generous variety of concentrates in forms quite different from the bricks of hash that had remained unchanged for generations. Yet few of the many customers in the many legal pot shops in America and the world have any idea of the rich cultural history of their favorite recreational or medicinal plant. New books by Chris Bennett and Thomas Hatsis lay bare the profound and pervading cultural influence of entheogens in general and cannabis in particular. The reissue of the classic book The Hasheesh Eaters illustrated and published by Gwyllm would be an ideal edition to any short shelf on the history, and the spiritual and artistic implications. of the herb superb and its derivatives.
But there’s much more to Gwyllm Lwydd than that. Gwyllm’s experience is the American Experience. From metal wheeled skateboards to living next door to the Grateful Dead, from an 80s new wave band with iconic guitarist Nels Cline to the psychedelic music and spoken word stream Radio EarthRites, from famed acid blotter art to publishing an arts journal so beautiful it can be called an artifact, Gwyllm exemplifies a certain kind of renaissance man receiving too little attention in the media and perhaps in history as well. Historians and consumers prefer singular brands that achieve fame. But the true story of cultural change is in the hands of many. Some have no interest in fame. Some practice many crafts and trades. Their experiences help us appreciate the richness of life while inspiring us to make the most of our own lives. Welcome to the world of Gwyllm Lwydd, a man who heard Charlie Manson play, had his life changed by an unexpected talk with Ginsberg and Leary, and who was inspired to take his art seriously by Allyson and Alex Grey.
Ronnie Pontiac: You were a skateboarder before it became a professional sport. What was skateboarding like then?
I started skateboarding back in 1962-63. Metal Wheels. Some commercial boards, but lots handmade. I still have road rash scars on my left hand and side from eating a piece of gravel traveling down a long hill in Colorado. We were virtually alone where ever we boarded. The culture really didn’t take off until compound wheels. I think the real time of innovative boarding came about in the mid 70’s on. I left off after a few years, and then picked up skates in the 1970’s. I was even a skating waiter, working at the Sidewalk Cafe in Venice. Fun fact, I first met Robby Krieger outside of my girlfriend’s (at the time) Frozen Yogurt Store in Century City. They were old friends from the Whiskey days. He came sliding up, and Pam was all smiles to see him. He got all over West L.A. on that board.
All those guys in the Dog Town Documentary worked as busboys or hung around outside. Busboys on boards, waiters on skates and foot. The Sidewalk Cafe was lovely chaos, it was a great time to be alive in Venice. I skated Europe later. Any idea how difficult that can be on cobblestones? Ha! Along the way I did the skateboard parks in London with my skates. The locals couldn’t get their heads around it. Skated through Amsterdam, Germany, France. I love skateboards and skates, just haven’t been there in a long time.
I got my son a board when he was 8. Never used it as none of his friends were into it. Hopefully I will be around for his kids, so I can get them boards. It may just jump a generation. I watch board videos occasionally on YouTube. Amazed at the skill level. Good times!
You had some narrow escapes and other adventures as a young man that are worth telling? Care to share a couple here?
So many stories… I could start with the one where at 14 I hitchhiked from Denver up to Wyoming and caught a freight train to Salt Lake, and then another to Marysville California on the way to San Francisco to see The Jefferson Airplane. We ransacked a public bomb shelter (yeah, in case of nuclear war) for dried crackers and rock candy for our supplies. We hopped on the train outside of Cheyenne and rode inside the Refrigerator section of a freight car. No ice, so it was okay.
Got into Salt Lake, dodged and ran from rail dicks and hopped onto a flat bed with a truck trailer. Nearly lost my friend when he opened the door of the trailer, and got blown over the rails holding on for dear life. Hauled him back and we got inside the trailer to find it was full of something noxious, back out to below the trailer by the wheels. Did I mention we had no water? Oh yeah no water. Going across the desert at 70 miles an hour, being buffeted by the hot wind all of the way. Such thirst!
Finally went through Sparks Nevada, and then into the Sierra Nevada…which included a lengthy tunnel and a few short ones. We hit the lengthy tunnel and the smoke from the engine ahead of us made us cover our heads with our shirts so we could breath. It seemed like forever, acrid smoke billowing over us. I thought we would suffocate. (A week later a body would be found in that tunnel with the throat cut, thrown from a train. Was it on our train? I have thought of that for years. The ride down to Marysville took us past Grass Valley, and other parts of California that I would come to love years later.
When we arrived in Marysville, a rail worker gave us a watermelon, a true act of kindness. We were exceedingly filthy from the 2+ days of traveling that no amount of water seemed to clean us, but oh, I drank so much I thought I might flounder. Later we caught a truck ride down to Berkeley, to a commune of friends that we both knew. A week or two in to our stay there I dosed on LSD for the first time, ending up for awhile sitting underneath Country Joe and the Fish’s Farfisa organ as I came on at The Jabberwocky Cafe on Telegraph Avenue. I have a long tale of that night, but that is for another time. I ended working in the central valley picking crops during the day in August, and busking on the streets to make ends meet before I headed back to Denver. Didn’t get to see the Jefferson Airplane then, that would come later.
When I came back to Denver, I got busted by Detective John Grey. I can remember the police coming through the door and The Who’s “My Generation” on the record player. This began a year + of probation, 6 months in detention for being…myself and being busted multiple times.
After I moved to California (but didn’t stay there as a condition to get off of probation) I ended up as a mule for awhile for a consortium out of Austin carrying suitcases of Mescaline (extracted from Peyote) to exchange for Owsley Acid to bring back to Denver for distribution in Texas. If we had only known that Mr. Owsley was living in Denver about 2 miles away from the commune I was living in… At that point Mescaline was legal as was LSD, except in California. I never got paid in money, wasn’t my goal, but I gave away lots of Mescaline up and down the coast of California and in Colorado.
I recall one flight that I made. I dropped acid twice before getting on the airplane, smoking DMT for the first time, dropping again on the plane; ever see lightening erupt upwards and downwards from a cloud at night flying over the desert 36 thousand feet up? Dropped again at the airport, and in Berkeley. I kinda lost it about 24 hours in with that one. Found myself in a Volkswagen the morning after heading back to Colorado, sick as a dog, still peaking. I hitchhiked from outside of Salt Lake back to Denver. The guy who picked me up was packing a .45 and had a bottle of vodka between his legs which when he swigged he would hit the accelerator. He had me open the glove compartment, where he had a ounce
or so of weed. I rolled joints the whole way, terrified for my life. He was okay, but the gun was a real bummer.
I was bouncing back and forth between the Haight, L.A. and Denver all through that Summer into the early parts of 1968. I lived for a while 3 doors up and across the street from the Grateful Dead’s house. We would step out in the morning or when ever, check the streets for cops and light one up. Often times Pigpen, and Phil etc would be on the porch. They would wave, we would wave back.
Stayed for awhile at Superspade’s place after he got topped. We were cutting up kilos when the FBI pounded on the door late at night. You never saw so many people try to get out of a back door in so short of a time. “We are not interested in what you are doing, just want information” Poor Superspade had been found hanging off of a cliff in Point Reyes. He had gone to Sausalito with 35K to score, and never made it back. After the FBI came to the place, I was spooked, and left soon after.
Just before my 16th birthday I let the Mescaline connection go. Things were a bit weird and all enough. I made it back to Denver just before The Denver Be-In. I was down at 17th and Pearl when I bumped into Tim Leary and Allen Ginsberg in front of The Green Spider Coffee house, midway down the block from the where The Folklore Center was (now moved and still going). I had worked at the Green Spider the year before, anyway, I walked up to Tim and Allen and started talking to them. They spent an hour with me. It was the first time I think that adults had given me full attention. They both were kindness incarnate. One of those meetings that change your life forever. I have never forgotten that afternoon, or ever will. Saw them again the next day at the Be In. The Dead were playing, Allen was dancing, and there is a photo of me somewhere in a musty copy of the Denver Post dancing with a giant God’s Eye completely baked on Acid on a late summer’s afternoon.
The Awakening
Later in the fall with my friend Georgia, running into a couple of old Beats (well around the age of 35) driving an MG around the country turning people on to Opium. Spending a long weekend smoking and listening to their tales of San Francisco, India, Morocco. Taking hits on the pipe and racing to the back bedroom to fall into the bed in slow motion with Georgia as motes of dust glinted slowly dancing in the shafts of light cascading across the room. Dreaming.
So many tales. Getting shot at by a cop as I was trying to escape out a back door during a bust in Boulder in January 1968, escaping from detention and heading back to The Haight in a desperate run with friends, 9 of us in a 1950 Chevrolet with a platform to the front seat where the back and trunk used to be. Stopping on the continental divide, flat tire. Stars below us on the horizon lines, the nearest car perhaps 25 miles away. Breathtaking. A speed freak in the back talking nonstop for 16 hours, regardless of how many times he is asked to stop.
Getting busted for Jaywalking in the Haight. Getting busted for hitchhiking in Malibu. Running into the Manson women in front of the Drogg Store, where Charlie was playing inside. Such a creepy moment. The hackles stood up on my neck, and all I saw was darkness around them. That was pretty much the last straw so I finally giving up on the Haight, and moving to Lyme Kiln Creek in South Big Sur, but that is another tale altogether. After Big Sur, I dropped out of the scene for several years living deep in Northern California, pursuing Occult and Sufism studies before moving to Los Angeles in 1972. Lots more stories, lots of adventures.
How did you first encounter Ludlow’s The Hasheesh Eater? What was it about the book that captured your imagination?
Ah, skating again, in Venice. High probably, rolled into a bookstore, and there it sat on a shelf, beckoning to me. This is the Sätty /Michael Horowitz version. Sätty being a German artist who did collage work, living in San Francisco. His “Ship of Fools” print/poster was the first piece I ever bought…in 1966. Michael Horowitz, founding member of The Fitz Hugh Memorial Library/Tim Leary’s archivist/friend. (My friend as well and who I consider a mentor regarding all things publishing). Gorgeous cover, Silver and Black, a Sätty dream illustration, with David Singer’s font work. Did I say gorgeous? I opened it and discovered a world I had no idea about, the Victorian world of Hasheesh Eaters/Visionaries. I still have my copy. A prized volume.
The art work, the tales were so enthralling. I was using lots of Lebanese and Afghani Hash at that point, exploring it by eating, smoking, etc. The tales paralleled my experiences that I was having with Hash at that time. I was exploring inner landscapes that often, actually almost always were either North African or West Asian. It was uncanny.
The more I read, the more I started to eat Hash. It was quite the affair. Mind you, I had never been to North Africa, or West Asia. Still it felt authentic. I recall sitting on a sand dune, with the tingling of bells from a caravan of camels passed behind me. There was a blazing sun (which seemed to be a central theme in all of these experiences time and again) overhead. Years later I heard those same bells, but in a field recording from North Africa.
Dust Storm
What inspired you to illustrate and publish a new edition of The Hasheesh Eater? in the first place, and now this even more lavish edition?
I realized that no one had stepped up to the challenge that Sätty/Michael Horowitz had lain down. There is a brilliant version from I think 1905 with the art of Aubrey Beardsley used to illustrate it . That is a collectors dream, out of my league.
I like projects. Weirdly, the more complicated and detailed the better. Fucking Virgo Sun and Libra Moon playing havoc in my life time and again. It also involves what I value highly: aesthetics. I cannot fathom how one would not approach this work without the visual component tied into it, and not designing the work to make a statement visually, and dare I say spiritually in that Ludlow’s work is highly charged with that.
So, I put together the original version, which is very comprehensive, and visually rich. Then, I realized I had to take it further. There are about 10 more illustrations in the Limited Editions along with almost 30 more pages of text. I could of gone on, but had to draw the line somewhere along the way.
This project has taken over two years of work, but more of dreaming of. I wanted to honour Fitz Hugh Ludlow’s influence and artistry, but I wanted to also pay homage to the workings of Sätty/Michael Horowitz for the dream that they produced together. One must tip the hat to ones influences and artistic progenitors.
Purchase The Hasheesh Eater Extended Edition
Your art and expression of adventures that have inspired you make for a nice and amusing mid-day break.
Wonderful stuff! I’ve bigges you up on facebook in the hope you will get more subscribers. Write the book!