Zabriskie Point- Sail On, Hippie Lovers

Just look at that picture for a minute. Maybe it's a Rorshach test, but what I once saw as silly and dangerous stupidity being celebrated as social revolution I now see as something more murky. It's easy to forget the drug experimentation and feelings of godliness said trips brought on and poo poo them all as moments of passing youthful chemical fancy. These days, I'm not so sure.  Leave politics out of it, and the search for personal illumination via chemical transformation remains a viable alternative to church.  I've never felt a sense of the divine in a pew, but I was overwhelmed by a sense of oneness with all things living while frying on a jetty in Newport.  Are these just ephemeral illusory states delivered by Hoffman that connects and then opens neural pathways one can't access when the 12 hours are up?  I've never met a single acid devotee who buys that line, and I don't buy it either. The memories and, more importantly, the feelings, linger. Why is the acid head's pure belief in the divine while frying less legitimate than the knee-bending wafer receiver at Sunday mass?   Most acid music meanders into places that send you reaching for the remote and all things secular, but this soundtrack of an unwatchable movie delivers mostly quiet, acoustic sounds that play gentle on morning ears.  I flip it back and forth and putter about my day.  John Fahey's "Dance of Death" is a particular standout, and even Pink Floyd surprises here, producing the backdrop for the bad side of that desert trip. Jerry Garcia's guitar sounds- dare I say it- lovely. Two minutes on your  knees in the dollar soundtrack bin will probably produce this sucker. I say glide toward the numinous...