The Associated Press

Paul McCartney says he got no thrill from heroin, but found cocaine more to his liking for a time.

"I tried heroin just the once," McCartney said in an interview with London's Daily Mirror about his past drug use.

"Even then, I didn't realize I'd taken it. I was just handed something, smoked it, then found out what it was.

"It didn't do anything for me, which was lucky because I wouldn't have fancied heading down that road," the former Beatle was quoted as saying.

McCartney's drug use has resulted in at least one brush with the law. A planned tour of Japan in 1980 was derailed when the singer was arrested at Tokyo's airport for possession of marijuana and later deported.

Despite enjoying cocaine for a time, he said he eventually turned against the drug.

"I did cocaine for about a year around the time of Sgt. Pepper," he said, referring to the Beatles' 1967 album.

"Coke and maybe some grass to balance it out. I was never completely crazy with cocaine.

"I'd been introduced to it and at first it seemed OK, like anything that's new and stimulating.

"When you start working your way through it, you start thinking: 'Mmm, this is not so cool an idea,' especially when you start getting those terrible comedowns," McCartney said. He confirmed that drugs influenced some of the group's songs.

"A song like 'Got to Get You Into My Life,' that's directly about pot, although everyone missed it at the time," McCartney said.

" 'Day Tripper,' that's one about acid (LSD). 'Lucy in the Sky,' that's pretty obvious. There's others that make subtle hints about drugs, but, you know, it's easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles' music."

John Lennon, who wrote "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," had denied it was about drugs, and said it was inspired by a nursery school drawing by his son, Julian.

"Just about everyone was doing drugs in one form or another and we were no different, but the writing was too important for us to mess it up by getting off our heads all the time," McCartney added.