In the 1960s, the so-called 'peluts' (a derogatory term for a certain type of young man) established themselves not only in the Pitiusas Islands but also in Mallorca and Menorca. Thanks to their influence, some residents came into contact with the world of drugs.
PalmThe movement hippie It erupted in 1965 in California (USA), in the midst of the Vietnam War. They were young people who held a more modern worldview (hip (in English) with slogans like 'make love, not war'. They would be dubbed the 'flower children' in reference to their pacifist emblem. These were, however, children from well-to-do families who could afford to travel to the other side of the world, to places where they could live freely.
One of the favorite destinations of these privileged 'anti-establishment' individuals was the Pitiusas Islands, which, in Francoist Spain at the time, were presented as an oasis of freedom, with very affordable prices. The local population would know them as 'peluts' because of their unkempt appearance. In 1965, the New York director Edward Mann released the film Generation HallucinationThe protagonist is a young man from San Francisco who arrives in Ibiza in search of drugs and sex. The film caused a sensation at the Cannes Film Festival. However, due to Francoist censorship, it wasn't released in Spain until 1977.
In 1969, however, the dictatorship was unable to stop the impact it had MoreThe film, by the Franco-Swiss director Barbet Schroeder, told the story of a young German man who, in the Pitiusas Islands, discovers both the pleasures and the hell of drugs in the company of a young American woman. The soundtrack was provided by Pink Floyd, the legendary British progressive rock band that had been a regular in Formentera since 1967. The album cover featured the Teuet windmill on the smaller of the Pitiusas Islands, and in 1971, two more musical tributes were released by resident artists who were also captivated by the film's spirit. hippie: Formentera Lady, from the British group King Crimson, and Me, the lady, and the toad, by the Catalan Pau Riba. Following the premiere of More The number of German and French tourists on both islands skyrocketed. The culmination of this hallucinogenic trend came in 1976 with the opening of the Amnesia nightclub in Ibiza. Its promoter was the Madrid-born philosopher Antonio Escohotado, who in 1983 would write General history of drugs.
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Joan Graves on guitar in 1968 at Ca n'Alluny, home of Robert GravesArxiu Tomàs Graves
Tourism business niche
Although smaller, tourism hippie It also reached Mallorca and Menorca. Its influence can be traced in the latest book by historian Tomeu Canyelles entitled Riding the Abyss: Drug Culture in the Balearic Islands (Leonario Muntaner, Editor). "Between 1966 and 1967," he asserts, "Mallorca, along with Barcelona and Melilla, was considered part of a triangle for drug trafficking into Europe, with tourists as the main customers. Many had suffered the trauma of World War II and saw drugs as a means of escape."
At that time, there were groups like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones who romanticized the consumption of psychedelic substances, which, as the Greek etymology of the term indicates, allowed one to make visible (dêlos) the soul (psycheOn March 31, 1968, the Teatro Balear in Palma hosted the first Psychedelic Festival, featuring local bands and groups from mainland Spain. A year later, the Woodstock festival took place in New York, giving the movement significant international exposure. flower power.
The nightclubs of boom The tourist industry didn't hesitate to take advantage of those rich 'peluts', who were so often criticized or ridiculed by the press and cinema with films like Being a hippie once a year won't hurt. (1968), starring Alfredo Landa. In 1968, British businessman Mike Jeffery opened Sgt. Pepper's in Palma. Located in Plaça Mediterrani, the club took its name and psychedelic iconography from the revolutionary Beatles album released a year earlier. It opened on July 15th with a performance by the guitar star of the moment, American Jimi Hendrix, whose manager Jeffery was. "On August 10th," Canyelles states, "Sgt. Pepper's organized its first party." hippieThe 'Psychedelic Show'. Later, other venues in Palma would also do the same, which helped to popularize the entire aesthetic attributed to the Mallorcan public. hippie movement"Bell-bottom trousers, brightly colored shirts, flowers, long hair, extravagant coat racks..."
"Most of the drugs consumed," the researcher points out, "were variants of cannabis such as marijuana, hashish, and the famouschocolate'which legionnaires stationed in Africa used to carry without having to go through any checks. LSD was also circulating, and to a lesser extent, heroin. These substances were completely unknown to the local population.' To prevent the contagion effect, in 1967 the Francoist dictatorship created the Special Narcotics Brigade.
The Deià Microchrome
The 'peluts' eventually penetrated the heart of the Tramuntana mountain range, in Deià, a small fishing village discovered in 1929 by the British writer Robert Graves. But their presence made the author of The white goddess (1948), which curiously had become the bedside book of flower power In the U.S. In 1969, in a letter, he wrote: "To the dung hippie He was told to leave the village." The youngest son of the Oxford scholar, Thomas Graves, 72, recalls that atmosphere in Tuning up at dawnThe Spanish translation, recently published by Libros del Kultrum, comes 21 years after its English publication. "The heavy emigration the town had suffered," he says, "had left many houses empty, which were rented at very good prices. Here, however, two castes could be distinguished..." hippiesThere were those who lived in very precarious conditions, as squatters, in Cala Deià, going nude and stealing oranges from orchards to survive. They were the ones who caused the most rejection among the residents of Deià. On the other hand, there were those who didn't suffer any hardship thanks to the money their parents sent them.
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Musician Daevid Allen (dressed in a black robe) was the creator of the Bananamoon Observatory community in Deià.Arxiu Tomeu Canyelles
The figure of Tomás Graves's father attracted a legion of musicians to Deià, among them the Australian Daevid Allen. "In 1966, he climbed a mountain, where he had a kind of epiphany that led him to create one of the most renowned bands of English psychedelia: Soft Machine. He did so with the help of the British musicians Kevin Ayers, Mike Ratledge, and Robert Wyatt." Many parties were organized in the village. "I especially remember one from when I was 14. I opened the icebox and found hashish inside a butter can. I never tried any drugs, not even when I was older and started playing with my brother Juan in the Pan Con Oli Band. As a passive smoker, I already got high on acid. It hit me hard thanks to an Italian-American named Paul Arnaboldi."
Joan Bibiloni
In 1968, Allen created The Bananamoon Observatory at his home in the Puig area. It was a community dedicated to cultivating the spirit, art, and music, which would later become the seed of the experimental band Gong. In 1971, the Australian artist moved to a house in the Clot neighborhood, which he converted into a recording studio. From there, he helped record albums for friends such as the Catalan Pau Riba and the Valencian Pep Laguarda.
Another guitarist who passed through Allen's studio was Joan Bibiloni from Manacor. Today, at 73, he remains as vibrant as ever with the release of his latest vinyl record titled The eyelids of the heart“Back then,” he says, “I lived in Llucalcari and used to go to Deià a lot. The concerts at the Las Palmeras bar were unforgettable. It was like an island within an island.” In 2013, one of the souls of that scene, the British musician Kevin Ayers, wanted his ashes to be laid to rest in the cemetery of his Mediterranean refuge. He would rest alongside two fellow mischievous souls: the English guitarist Ollie Halsall (1949-1992) and the German-Jewish artist Mati Klarwein (1932-2002), the designer of Carlos Santana’s psychedelic album covers.
Distorted Movement
Apart from Deià, the hippie communities spread to other relatively isolated areas of Mallorca such as Cala Mondragó, Cala Figuera and Portopetro (Santanyí), Biniaraix (Sóller), Estellencs, and Banyalbufar. Some of these "peluts" (long-haired hippies) arrived from Ibiza and Formentera, from where they had been expelled starting in 1968 with the establishment of the Balearic Islands Special Court for Vagrants and Delinquents. Initially, the dictatorship had seen them as perfect allies for projecting an image of tolerance abroad, thus attracting more tourists. However, it soon came to consider them "undesirable elements" due to the moral problem they represented.
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The shockwave of flower power It also reached Menorca, where its epicenter was the ancient necropolis of Cales Coves. Located nine kilometers south of Alaior, it was one of the most emblematic sites of the island's Talayotic past. In the 1980s, a new generation of hippies nudists. In 2000, the Island Council evicted them from the caves and blocked their access with metal sheets. "Today," laments historian Tomeu Canyelles, "neoliberalism has transformed a countercultural movement like the hippie movement in yet another consumer product catering to hedonism."
'Neohippies'
In the 1950s, the precursors to the hippies were the beatniks. They were a generation of American intellectuals who felt defeated by the happy and wealthy society of the American way of life that emerged after World War II. Some of them also settled in Mallorca. This was the case of the poet Robert Creeley, who in 1952 moved with his family to Banyalbufar, where he founded the publishing house Divers Press.
In the late 1970s, hippies gave way to neo-hippies. One of them was the artist Ricardo Gago, originally from Zamora (Castilla y León). He arrived in Mallorca in 1968, at the age of 19. "I came," he says, "to work as a waiter and then I got a job as a section manager in one of the first department stores on the island. Soon, I was able to buy a property in Alaró. In the 1980s, I moved to a larger one, near Sineu, where I've remained ever since." Captivated by flower power, Gago knew he wanted to be in contact with nature. "We were a group of friends who had read many books written by the Ibiza hippies. I wanted to work in agriculture and make a living from crafts like them, but I soon realized it wasn't so easy. With children to support, the priority was having a steady income to cover expenses."
The artist from Zamora tried to be somewhat self-sufficient in the countryside, making bread with store-bought flour and cheese with his goats' milk. He attempted to practice a responsible form of neo-hippie lifestyle, although he was forced to get around in a Renault 4L of that era. "I knew," he says, "hippies from the '60s who lived without worries thanks to their parents' financial support. I, however, had to fend for myself." The sculptor finds it unthinkable that today's younger generations could follow his approach to life from his youth. "Everything is incredibly expensive. Only the wealthy can afford to buy a house in a flash to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. They don't want to live off the land, which requires work, but rather live in the countryside with an internet connection. And, meanwhile, the countryside is dying. It makes me very sad to see how devastated Mallorca is."
Gago's relationship with drugs was rather limited. "I smoked a joint or two, but that's about it." Other young people in the 1980s fared worse, suffering schizophrenic episodes or dying from heroin, colloquially known as "horse." Historian Tomeu Canyelles highlights the origin of that psychotropic pandemic: "The islanders who came into contact with the world of narcotics in the 1960s failed to grasp the dangers of addiction. They became hooked innocently, without any information." In 1985, given the seriousness of the situation, the National Drug Plan was approved, and in 1987, the NGO Projecte Home was founded in Mallorca at the behest of Bishop Teodor Úbeda.