From The Times
September 4, 2007
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article2382147.ece
Live fast, die young . . . or is the rock ‘n’
roll lifestyle more fiction than fact?
Nigel Hawkes, Health Editor
In rock music, dying young has famously been described as a good career move. Dead icons
often sell more CDs than they ever did when they were alive.
But do rock and pop stars really die young or simply slip from public attention and die decades
later, uncelebrated? A team of public health doctors from Liverpool John Moores University put
the issue to the test. They assembled a list of 1,064 famous musicians, including Elvis Presley
and Eminem. Then they worked out how many had died, and at what age, comparing their
mortality with that of a matched sample of ordinary citizens from the US and Europe.
We all know that rock musicians hang up their guitars early, after brief lives fuelled by drink, drugs
and a resolute avoidance of five portions of fruit and vegetables a day. But, say the authors, led
by Mark Bellis, in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health: “Young deaths of popular
musicians receive widespread media coverage, yet relatively little attention is paid to numerous
premature deaths routinely occurring in the general population.” So the general impression could
be a false one.
“Musicians can disappear from public attention as they age and deaths in older musicians may go
unnoticed, leaving a disproportionate impression of premature deaths,” they say. Of the 1,064
musicians selected, 100 had died by the end of 2005 – almost twice as many as would be
expected from an average group of the same age. Deaths are highest in the early years of fame,
with US and European musicians alike suffering more than three times as many as would be
expected in their first five years.
A rock survivor in Europe, more than 25 years after achieving fame, has a death rate slightly
higher than a contemporary with a more conventional career, the research indicated. But
American musicians continue to die in greater numbers. Over the first 25 years, the risk of dying
is 1.7 times higher. A disproportionate number of deaths are caused by drink or drugs. In Europe,
these killed 28 per cent of the musicians who had died, with drug or alcohol-related accidents
accounting for 7 per cent, and resultant chronic disorders 3.5 per cent. In the US, overdoses
caused 15 per cent of deaths, chonic disorders related to abuse 10 per cent, and drink and drug
accidents 3 per cent. Heart disease accounted for only 3.5 per cent of European musicians’
deaths but 18 per cent among the Americans. Yet the median age of death is lower in Europe 35 rather than 42. Europeans may start their careers younger and die early of immediate insults
to the system, while Americans contract degenerative diseases.
Rock stars who died young:
Sid Vicious 21 Overdosed on heroin
Eddie Cochran 21 Car crash
Buddy Holly 22 Plane crash
Aaliyah 22 Plane crash
Ian Curtis 23 Suicide (hanging)
Selena (Quintanilla-Pérez) 23 Murdered (shot by president of her fan club)
Tupac Shakur 25 Murdered (shot)
Janis Joplin 27 Overdosed on heroin
Kurt Cobain 27 Suicide (shot himself)
Brian Jones 27 Drowned
Jim Morrison 27 Officially recorded as a heart attack (various cases of death have been offered
including drug overdose, respiratory illness and natural causes)
Jimi Hendrix 27 Believed to have asphyxiated on his own vomit after drinking wine and taking
sleeping pills
Marc Bolan 29 Car crash
Jeff Buckley 30 Drowned
Patsy Cline 30 Plane crash
Lisa ‘Left Eye’ Lopez 30 Car crash
Karen Carpenter 32 Heart failure (due to anorexia)
Keith Moon 32 Overdosed on anti-seizure medication taken as part of an alcohol treatment
programme
Bon Scott 33 Acute alcohol poisoning
Stevie Ray Vaugn 35 Helicopter crash (after being addictions to drugs and alcohol)
Bob Marley 36 Cancer (for which he refused traditional treatment, due to his Rastafarian beliefs)
Elvis Presley 42 Heart attack
John Lennon 40 Murdered (shot)
Marvin Gaye 44 Shot by father during argument
Freddie Mercury 45 AIDS
Frank Zappa 52 Cancer
John Entwistle 57 Overdosed on cocaine
Ian Dury 57 Cancer
George Harrison 58 Cancer
Dusty Springfield 59 Cancer