







Pihkal: A Chemical Love Story, by Alexander Shulgin and Ann Shulgin is one of the strangest books I've ever read. Alexander Shulgin is a well known psychedelic chemist, and he has synthesized hundreds of drugs, which he and his wife Ann have taken and written about in Pihkal (Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved) and in their follow up book, Tihkal (Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved). Fortunately for Alexander, he has a Drug Enforcement Administration Analytical License that allows him to possess, identify, and analyze drugs that would land other psychonauts in the slammer.

Vice recently sent Hamilton Morris ("VBS's resident expert in all substances mind-bending") to the Shulgins' home in Northern California for a video interview.

After spending days, weeks, months poring over the work of psychonaut-in-chief, Alexander Shulgin, Hamilton Morris mustered up the chutzpah to give him a call and request an interview. The result is this: an epic love-fest on the man who birthed Ecstasy in a test-tube. Hamilton visits the Shulgin residence (in San Francisco, naturally) and tempers his fanboy freakout with a rare and intensive look at the home and laboratory that caused the balls of millions to trip.

SiHKAL: Shulgins I Have Known and Loved – Hamilton's Pharmacopeia | VBS.TV