This story has been heard many times, but just in case you missed it:
It is the opening night of the Who's North American 1973 tour.
Unbeknown to the rest of the group , someone in the bands entourage provided drummer Keith moon with 8 animal tranquilizers, informing him that swallowing half a pill with a cup of brandy would result in an interesting 'high'.
Keith proceeded to pronounce 'half of one!, I'm Keith Moon' and swallowed all of them at once.
According to Guitarist Pete Townshend, they were the type of capsuals that were to be shot from a gun, rather than to be ingested, let alone by a human being!
Understandably not too far into the bands set, after drumming erratically and changing tempo uncontrollably, Moon keeled over backwards .
After being dragged backstage and injected with a shot of cortazone, the drummer returned to the stage to continue playing halfway through the next song, before collapsing again.
Eager to continue the set anyway, Townshend asked if there was anybody in the audience that could play the drums!
A19 year old named Scott Halpin walked up on stage and took over the role of drummer for the remainder of the set, and although was not rehearsed with any of the timing changes evidently managed to keep a steady hold on the complexities of Townshends music.
Footage of Scott Halpin playing with the who can be seen below:
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