Carlos Santana Was Once Dosed By Jerry Garcia Before Getting on an Airplane

Whether in the studio or on the road, many classic rock stars have wild stories of the times they crossed paths. Certainly, Carlos Santana has his fair share of stories about making music in the 1960s and 1970s.

And during that time – long before millennials would discover his music, thanks to 1999 hit “Smooth” – Santana was once dosed with drugs by none other than Jerry Garcia while boarding an airplane.

Carlos Santana and Jerry Garcia often experimented with drugs

Like many other artists of the day, Santana and Garcia – whether together or separately – indulged in drugs during their musical heyday. Even though Santana once faced legal trouble for possession of marijuana, he has been open about his experiences with harder drugs as well. The singer’s career, after all, was blowing up in the late 1960s, neatly timed with Woodstock.

Santana’s self-titled band, in fact, released their debut studio album in August 1969, the very same month that Woodstock took place in Bethel, New York. Over the next several decades, Santana released countless more albums, including several solo albums. Hits like “Evil Ways,” “Black Magic Woman,” and “Smooth” would come to define his signature brand of music.

Jerry Garcia once dosed Carlos Santana while he was on a plane

While Santana’s life and career have led him through all kinds of misadventures, the singer opened up about one particular incident involving Garcia. In a 2019 interview with The New York Times, Santana detailed how, after being “baptized into consciousness expanding,” Garcia secretly dosed him prior to the musician boarding an airplane.

At the time, Santana was opening for Garcia’s band, the Grateful Dead. Santana took precautions, saying “I made sure to carefully wash this Coca-Cola can I was going to drink,” but that didn’t help him in the long run.

“But what I didn’t know is, they knew how to put a syringe in the soda can. So we played our set and left, and on the way from the airport to the plane, the hall kept getting longer and longer. The colors in the carpet and in the wall started oozing like lava. … When I sat down on the plane, I looked out the window as we were taking off, and the Vegas lights looked like Aztec hieroglyphics.”

Carlos Santana had a wild experience performing at Woodstock

That “intense” experience – Santana’s own description of it – was far from the only time Santana was under the influence of both drugs and Garcia. When Santana performed with his band at Woodstock, the guitarist was high on mescaline, which he used in the presence of Garcia.

However, because he was called onstage earlier than expected, Santana was forced to perform with the drug still in his system. This led to a surreal experience in which Santana believed his guitar was a snake he needed to control and – in the process – an unforgettable performance.