The Economist ran a snippet on their website about Rock Star mortality.

ROCK stars are famous for excess, and some pay the price. A new study suggests that they are up to three times more likely to die young than the rest of the population, mainly because of drug and alcohol abuse.

Reasearchers at Liverpool John Moores University looked at survival rates for over 1000 European and American musicians between 1956 and 1999. The causes for deaths were overdoses, accidents, chronic disease related to drugs and drink, cancer and heart disease, conditions associated with unhealthy lifestyles. The study is published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

Rockstars of today or celebrities that have a rockstar lifestyle should get a copy of this, I think.

This study set me thinking about rockstars I know or aware of who died young. I have compiled a list below. There is no order except that those at the top came to mind first.

Jim Morrison - frontman of The Doors died in 1971 at age 27. There was no official autopsy and therefore there are many questions related to the cause of death. However it is believed that he died of a heroin overdose.

Jimi Hendrix - the greatest and most influential guitarist to have ever walked on this earth (Eric Clapton is there too) died after being drowned in his own vomit. He was 28

Stevie Ray Vaughan - the greatest and most influential blues guitarist to have walked on this earth died after the helicopter in which he was traveling crashed into a ski slope. He was with Eric Clapton’s crew; Clapton was still playing at the Alpine Valley Music Theatre. It could have been Clapton had not Stevie Ray taken the offer to ride the copter. Stevie Ray was 36.

Duane Allman - founder member of the Allman Brothers Band was another influential guitarist who made the slide guitar format his own. He was killed in a motorcycle accident. He lost control of his Harley while trying to avoid a truck, flew from his bike, which landed on him, crushing his internal organs. He was just 25.

John Bonham - the drummer of Led Zeppelin and another influential musician known for his power, thump and probably defined the hard rock drumming! You can feel that thump in the Led Zeppelin song ‘When the levee breaks’. In fact, if you close your eyes, you can see a horde of thousand horsemen descending into the valley in slow motion.
He died of asphyxiation from his own vomit. He had downed 16 shots of vodka and continued to drink until he fell asleep. He was 32 years old.

Kurt Cobain was one of the greatest singer-songwriters who rendered songs in what we now call grunge. Kobain killed himself. The autopsy report said that it was a result of a ’self-inflicted shotgun wound to the head’. Kobain was 27 years old.

There are several others who died and left a mark. I have not attempted to list them all here. But just the ones that I could immediately recall. There are several others who would have died but have comeback into the right path. Eric Clapton is one such comeback man. We could have lost him to drug abuse, but for Pete Townshend.

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