Ted Nugent Blames Hippies for Divorce, Abortion, Drugs and Crime

It was only a matter of time before Ted Nugent decided to rain on the Summer of Love's anniversary parade. In an article from today's Wall Street Journal titled "The Summer of Drugs," the notoriously opinionated guitar god took some time off his busy hunting schedule to blame "stoned, dirty, stinky hippies" for "rising rates of divorce, high school drop-outs, drug use, abortion, sexual diseases and crime, not to mention the exponential expansion of government and taxes."

Highlights (including some choice words for Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin):
• On the Summer Of Love: "Honest and intelligent people will remember it for what it really was: the Summer of Drugs."
• On Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Mama Cass: "I often wonder what musical peaks they could have climbed had they not gagged to death on their own vomit."
• On the hippie movement: "Turned off by the work ethic and productive American Dream values of their parents, hippies instead opted for a cowardly, irresponsible lifestyle of random sex, life-destroying drugs and mostly soulless rock music that flourished in San Francisco."
• On life as the Nuge: "Clean and sober for 59 years, I am still rocking my brains out and approaching my 6,000th concert. Clean and sober is the real party."

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Song Stories

“Oh Sherrie”

Steve Perry | 1984

Steve Perry's girlfriend Sherrie Swafford was actually in the studio when Perry began writing this song--his lone Top Ten hit as a solo act--with two co-writers. The trio began at midnight one night with just "Oh, Sherrie!" and "hold on, hold on." Three hours later, they had a complete song. Swafford, however, had to wait until the next day to hear it. "Sherrie actually got tired and went to bed," Perry said. She also appeared in the video, but their relationship did not hold on for long.

More Song Stories entries »

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