Songfacts®:

• Talking Heads leads singer David Byrne was never big into drugs, but was intrigued by those who fell under their spell. In this song, he's not making a judgment, just exploring a mind on acid. He called it "a psychedelic song," telling NME, "I like those '60s numbers where they try and describe the experience... They're stupid. There's a big resurgence of acid in Paris apparently. The people from the disco where we played go on huge acid binges, hiring trains and stuff. That's a little intense for me."
• Byrne had developed a tight relationship at this point with Brian Eno, who produced the group's second, third and fourth albums. "Drugs" was part of the third, Fear Of Music, which in typical Eno and Byrne fashion, pushed musical boundaries. To create a suitably breathless sounding vocal, Eno had Byrne jog in place while putting down his vocal track. Running in place became one of his stage moves, seen a few times in the 1984 Talking Heads concert film Stop Making Sense.
• Before it was released on the album as "Drugs," the band performed this song under the title "Electricity."