Who Killed the U.S. Cannabis Market? Blame Canadian Investment Bankers
How speculative finance and distorted incentives hollowed out American weed. On a sunny afternoon in Santa Monica in the spring of 2018, I sat on a hotel patio with the owners of two up-and-coming cannabis businesses: one a popular low-cost brand and the other a NorCal farming co-op. I had an all-cash offer from investors…
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Jim Belushi on Weed, His Latest Movies and the Mess We’re in Right Now
Now 71, Chicago-born Jim Belushi is having a moment with roles in two current films – Kristen Stewart’s The Chronology of Water, in which he plays counterculture legend Ken Kesey, and the pop musical, Song Sung Blue, co-starring Kate Hudson and Hugh Jackman. Before Belushi moved to Oregon and launched his cannabis company Belushi’s Farm…
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The Devil’s Lettuce Wears Prada: Stylist Patricia Field Is Bringing THC to Fashion Week
Cannabis has been moving through that underground-to-icon pipeline for decades. So when Patricia Field’s universe collides with a hemp-derived THC beverage on the eve of New York Fashion Week, it doesn’t feel provocative. It feels right on time. This is, after all, the same creative force behind Sex and the City and The Devil Wears…
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The Good Times Didn’t Kill Him After All: Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock on Mushrooms and New Music
Isaac Brock is holed up in his Portland studio, Ice Cream Party, which is essentially a multi-level playground for musicians. Surrounded by a collection of guitars, an array of colorful pedals and a treasure trove of Modest Mouse ephemera, Brock cracks a Guinness, a beer he says he only drinks during interviews. Before he finishes…
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Cannabis Just Beat the Roses: A Weed Strain Won Europe’s Top Garden Award
It wasn’t a cannabis competition. It wasn’t a weed expo. It was a traditional, old-school horticulture trade fair. Think geraniums, tomatoes, ornamental breeding programs, and irrigation systems. And still, a cannabis plant came out on top. At this year’s edition of IPM Essen, the world’s leading horticulture trade show held annually in Germany, a strain…
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Smell Over Potency? This New Tech Says That’s the Future of Weed.
For decades, cannabis marketing trained consumers to chase numbers. THC percentages became shorthand for potency, quality, and value. But if you’re one of those people who still crack a jar and give it a good whiff before deciding what to buy, you’re not stuck in the past. You’re just ahead of the science. Today, smell…
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What Actually Happens at the Oscars of Weed: How the NYC High Times Cannabis Cup Will Go Down
On February 7, High Times is bringing the New York Cannabis Cup Awards Night to Sony Hall, turning one of Manhattan’s most iconic venues into a full-spectrum celebration of weed, culture and community. This isn’t a trade floor or a daytime expo. It’s an evening built for brands, retailers, judges, press and longtime supporters of…
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Strange Bedfellows: NORML and the NRA Both Want The Cannabis Gun Ban Cut Back
Sometimes the clearest sign that a law has outlived reality is who shows up to challenge it. In a case now headed to the Supreme Court, NORML and the National Rifle Association are effectively on the same side, opposing a federal rule that can turn marijuana users into prohibited gun owners, even when they are…
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Tegridy Ruined Randy
Tegridy Farms turned South Park’s most unpredictable character into a one-note caricature, mirroring how cannabis capitalism hollowed out something that once felt alive. There’s a popular Toy Story meme on the internet where Andy, in a moment of self-improvement, drops Woody because he’s done, he’s served his purpose, and, because that’s life, he makes room…
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California Is Spending Millions to Decide What Counts as ‘Real’ Cannabis Flavor
When California legalized adult-use cannabis, it did something bold and imperfect. It moved faster than science. That was not recklessness. It was necessity. For decades, federal law treated cannabis as a Schedule I substance, effectively blocking large-scale, real-world research into its health, economic, environmental, and social effects. States that chose legalization were forced to build…
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