Rock ‘n’ Roll ‘n’ Drug Abuse

Jonathan Melvoin’s death last week from a heroin overdose should send a strong message to the music industry that its blind-eye attitude toward drug use is dangerous. Melvoin, 34, the keyboardist touring with the alternative band Smashing Pumpkins, died Friday after shooting up in a New York hotel, the latest in a string of drug-related fatalities in the music business. These deaths underline the fact that heroin--despite its newfound popularity in the middle class--is still the same old lethal junk.

Recognizing the addiction problem that captured national attention when Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain committed suicide, music executives met late last year to organize an effort to combat drugs in the industry. Five record companies publicly endorsed the fledgling effort last month. Others should join. But the campaign requires more than just a hotline and lip service. Companies need to actively help addicted musicians get treatment and to refuse to deal with those who won’t.

The obstacles are tough. One music executive indicated the depth of the industry’s fixation on the profits generated by its drug-abusing artists: “I believe in drug use,” he said. “It’s part of growing up and the creative process.” Even a cold bottom-line approach makes clear that it’s bad business when promising careers are cut short by a fix. And it’s ridiculous to assume that successful rock ‘n’ roll depends on drugs. Look at the staying power of Aerosmith, whose members disavowed drug use in the 1980s.

Record companies have a responsibility to the artists they sign--not to mention to the young consumers who buy albums that are as much about image as music. And when kids hear their favorite singer wax about the ecstasy of heroin, it conveys the wrong image. Here’s an image: Melvoin, probably already dead, being propped up under a shower in a futile effort to revive him. Glamorous?