Boy was I off on my thinking on this one.  Actually I'm starting to worry about myself because I seem to have a difference of opinion quite frequently, I'm not sure if that's good or bad.

This is the song that if I had the option to leave off the CD, I probably would.  I skip it often.  Someone else said Rick's voice sounds strained throughout this whole album, and I agree that it is very apparent on this song.   The beginning music however, sounds like a cross between Duran Duran's "All she wants is" and "Notorious".  Once I get past the Sam Kinison voice (that's what the beginning reminds me of - which is also so Duran-ish) the music makes me yearn to dig out some of those Duran CD's.

Ok, enough Duran talk, this IS a Rick song.  I had always interpreted the word psychoactive as someone who was outwardly crazy.  Psycho - active....anyone else see that?  The thing with the psychoactive person in this song is that she's so crazy, she's hypersexual.  You know, wanting more sex than the typical woman?    Rick does not see a problem with that, however I'd be a little worried about meeting up with a sex-crazy woman if I was Rick at any time in his career.   Rick even questions throughout the song that he's not sure if he's crazy or if she is, but he obviously is going to go along with the ride.  (I think there's an intended pun there.)

I'm really having a hard time figuring out why this one is on the CD.   The song that is known to have come from these sessions, Love Receiver was left off.   Why was this one considered better than that one?  If the group was going with a kicky-dance sounding type of song, they kind of lose it at the end and I find that even at the beginning it's hard to even keep your toe tapping to it. 

This one goes Pfffft!  in my book. 

I like this song because it is pure innuendo.  I think Psychoactive holds the key to listening to Sahara Snow.  It's just a fun and a REALLY light-hearted-male-oriented lust song.  I laugh when I listen to this song.  It's as good as Love Receiver to me. They are both funny.  I can just see these three guys in the studio cracking each other up as they were figuring out the lyrics and stuff.  The funny thing about this song is that he's blaming her for his attraction (all these fantasies she's triggering)... when it may only be his horniness.  Having worked in Psych.  makes the psychoactive funny to me because it reminds me of LSD, which is a psychoactive substance that makes you hallucinate... I guess the writer of this song is addicted to women, who are psychoactive to him. 

I can't remember who said this:  The music is too different from Karma.  I think it was a lot of people.  I kind of liked the difference of the two because it means that we won't ever fall into the ZZ-TOP dilemma of every song sounding the same with Rick.  One of my friends listened to the two CD's and liked Sahara Snow, but hated Karma.  She thought SS sounded more like the old Rick.  I like both for different reasons.

This song would be so much better for me if it wasn't for the opening line.  It just sounds so evil.  Maybe if that was Rick's voice saying "satisfy the flesh" (or is it?), it'd be different. I know for the longest time the song would start off and I'd just skip it because of the opening.  Kind of reminds me in a way of State of the Heart and that evil voice with the "who's there?". 

So getting past that first line, I really do like this song.  I think there is some really great rhyme scheme going on, and I'm a total sucker for that.  I really like the thought of the girl being like a drug, an addictive drug that triggers hallucination/fantasies to the point where he doesn't know what's real and what's in his mind.

I can so identify with the feeling of your "sane" self arguing with your "insane" self and my insane self is always winning.

The line that stands out for me is :
Hey little sister
I still sleep alone in my bed

What's wrong with this picture? Definitely something wrong with that picture!!!!  Wrong, wrong wrong :-)

When I first started listening to this song I totally listened to it from the perspective that the song was about the girl kind of "teasing" him and that he was singing about the craziness of what that was doing to him. The wanting, not having/getting. You get the picture.

Then I didn't really think too much about the title either. I never really sat down and tried to "define" what I thought that Psychoactive meant. Enter this little review group thing. I started really digging into the lyrics and it totally changed what I thought of the song. Well, one aspect of it. I really get the feeling that the object of his fantasies has no clue that he is completely lusting over her. There is such wanting and frustration in this song.

Here's my crazy theory. He's not available, but he's tempted by someone or I should say tempted to pursue someone that totally triggers something hot and definitely sexual for him. Sticking with my above thoughts this person probably has no idea about all of his "feelings" and is not doing anything purposefully to garner those feelings and thoughts. At this point he has this fantasy "relationship" with this person. He dreams about her. Has obsessive fantasies about her "My love is out of control."

Then we reach the chorus. This is finally where my brain came up with its theory on what the word psychoactive means. To me it means this person (as she exists in his fantasies) really exists only in his head. There is a real person, but he has "created" this whole other person in his fantasy world. She fires his IMAGINATION. (I take this to mean the fantasy "relationship".) He feels no guilt in his thoughts about this person because there really is no physical one-on-one relationship. The fact that everything's a fantasy, makes that offer so attractive.

Having said that it is NOT that he doesn't THINK about actually acting on his feelings with this person. Through the whole song he is battling with himself about whether to let this fantasy person remain just a fantasy or whether to pursue something real as far as a relationship (definitely physical). I think there are two things to this battle. One, he's committed to someone else.  Two he's not very confident in himself and afraid of this person rejecting him because he may not trigger the same thoughts in this person that SHE does in him. He's built up this amazing fantasy and the real thing may not live up to the intense physical thing he's got going on in his brain.... "Half of me's already there, half of me ain't got the stuff." "Could be this is nothing but my fantasy."