Howard Marks in discussion event with MC5 manager John Sinclair

The two can offer different takes on the 1960s counter culture

Every generation needs a figurehead to accentuate the fun side of drugs. From Thomas de Quincey to Sherlock Holmes and through to Timothy Leary, the Beatles and Bill Hicks, it’s not all been bad trips and cold turkey (if there any wags out there suggesting him, no, Richard Bacon doesn’t really count). There’s probably no cultural figure still alive who has witnessed just about every side of the narcotics world quite like Howard Marks.

It’s somewhat fitting that Mr Nice has a degree from Oxford in nuclear physics given that he has blown apart many preconceptions about the drugs industry and even now, in his late 60s, continues to campaign for the legalisation of recreational drug use.

In this event, he is joined by another core member of what used to be called the counter culture. John Sinclair is the chap who managed proto-punk band MC5, has a wide discography of spoken word material (Fattening Frogs for Snakes is worth a listen for that title alone) and led the militant anti-racist movement, the White Panther Party. Marks and Sinclair have plenty in common, not least the fact that both served spells in prison for drug convictions. Tonight, some pots will be getting well stirred.

Electric Circus, Edinburgh, Wed 6 Jun.