At a recent metal/alternative themed festival a couple of weeks ago in Sydney both Cherry Pop and Buzzz were readily available, in full view of police, from two different stalls.
The ingredients listed on Buzzz are: chocolate, honey, bitter orange, kanna, L-Tyrosine, octopamine, saffron, H20 and EtOH.
Cherry Pop is labelled as containing: guarana, citrus aurantium, pelargonium quercifolium, chocolate extract, octopamine and cherry flavour.
SWIM asked both stall holders if either of the two products interacted with MAOI's and was asked "what's that?"
The exact same thing happened at one of Canberra's larger university themed events a few months ago. Additionally this time they were also selling Prickly Pear that was labelled as containing absolutely no mescaline. SWIM still has the packaging.
Mods, if this is inappropriate in any way please feel free to edit this post as you like. SWIM is very concerned about the people who became very ill from these products and has been meaning to bring it up with "the head herb guy" ever since.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and translate the 'herbs' to the compounds utilised and estimated effects:
Buzzz:
chocolate - chocamine, a proprietary extract of cocoa containing methylxanthines (theobromine, caffeine, and theophylline), biogenic amines (phenylethylamine, tyramine, and according to one source, synephrine), amino acids (phenylalanine, tryptophan, tyrosine, others), minerals (with a high content of magnesium), numerous antioxidants, and possibly some non-psychoactive cannabanoid-related compounds.
honey - honey, sweetening agent
bitter orange - synephrine, ephedrine analogue and relatively potent stimulant
kanna - mesembrine, nonspecific ethnobotanical 'potentiator' with variably psychoactive effects, highly dose-dependent. Mostly unresearched profile of action, prolongs especially DMT experiences and is a suspected SSRI and potentially MAOI.
L-Tyrosine - l-Tyrosine, amino acid, doesn't like being mixed with MAOIs. probably included because of its reputed help with dtimulant comedown and withdrawals
octopamine - octopamine, widely touted but still uncertain neurotransmitter analogue of uncertain effectiveness. Promising and very interesting, but no concrete psychoactive effects as verified by independent trials (to my knowledge).
saffron - crocin/safranal, compounds shown to have a nonspecific anti-depressant effect with unknown mechanism of action.
H20 - water, carrier solvent.
EtOH - ethanol, carrier solvent.
Cherry Pop:
guarana - Good ol' caffeine, as well as raw stimulant effects it has profiles of action regarding the metabolism of primary amines, dopamine reuptake and other subtle actions.
citrus aurantium - synephrine
pelargonium quercifolium - 1,3-DMAA, vasoconstrictor and novel stimulant popular in the party pill crowd.
chocolate extract - chocamine, see above
octopamine - see above
cherry flavour - flavouring, unless there's some secret magic ingredient in cherries they don't want us to know about
But shit yeah, a lot of that would go nastily with MAOIs, not to mention that several of tyhe compounds themselves aren't altogether proven to be safe, or trialled and tested, and completely mapped in terms of contra-indications and side-effect profiles, so... legal highs are a bit of a crapshoot with your body. Rememebr that.