Rock "n' Roll Death Wish

Prof Mark Bellis, of the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool John Moores University has just published a paper to examine the perception that music artists "live fast and die younger".

He wanted to see if it's just that they are in the public eye- so we hear about the bad stuff that happens to them- or whether they actually do die younger (from a drug and alcohol induced illnesses?)

His study of over a 1000 recording artists has been widely picked up in the British press today (here's one example from the Daily Telegraph).

It makes quite shocking reading.

So many deaths are directly attributable to alcohol and drugs (like Jimi Hendrix) but many more deaths were very probably induced by heavy drug use (the people like Kurt Cobain who take the suicide opt-out).

Or drug induced heart-attacks, strokes, etc.

I will never forget working at Radio 1 on the lunchtime show and having INXS on as live guests (1994, I think).

Emma Freud (the presenter) was in the studio and I was given the job of being in the concert hall with the band (and all the listeners who had won tickets) and introducing them to the audience for their first warm-up number.

(Yes, it was nerve-wracking. Second only to making a speech- about Cruisewatch- from the Pyramid stage at Glastonbury; to over 50,000 people).

The most shocking thing that day with INXS was the state of Michael Hutchence.

This gorgeous, talented man, was a mess.

I looked into his eyes and he had the look of a man who was being hunted.

At the time, I was in my early 20s and fresh out of university. I couldn't understand why he was like he was?

Where was his confidence and self-worth?

The fear and and the pain coming off him was palpable.

A couple of years later, when I'd starting hitting the coke hard, I began to understand what a come-down can do to you.

What it feels like to feel your soul dying- feeling yourself ebb away and life being reduced to the next line (or drink, or fix).

How the paranoia makes other people look threatening and the world a very scary place.

There are so many addicts in the music business and as I said in The Guardian's article "Crash & Burn", last week:

People look at celebrities and say they've got it easy, they've got loads of money, they can go and get the best treatment. However, because there are so many liggers and arselickers in the industry, these people get very 'enabled'. How many artists have we lost to addiction? Far too many.

One of the biggest lies that fuels denial is that drugs make you more creative.

They don't.

In fact as addiction progresses they do the exact reverse.

Whilst certain drugs may fling open certain doors to perception- in the short-term- they are actually only a short-cut to states of consciousness that are available by much healthier means.

Saying that drugs "make you" creative is giving your power away.

Creativity is a natural state.

Having the confidence to access that and faith in yourself can be tough- but there are other ways to connect without taking substances.

I love Julia Cameron's book The Artist's Way. She has some really good tools- to overcome being stuck; and she's in recovery so understands the challenges of putting down the "props".

I hope the music business will listen to new this report and do more to help their employees- all of them- get good advice, information and treatment.


Right now the average life expectancy for a European rock star is 35 (42 in the US).

This is totally appalling.

The music business makes billions out of artists. They need to do a lot more to turn these terrible stats around.

Professional football has it's own treatment facilities for footballers and sportspeople like Tony Adams are doing a lot to help young footballers.

Some music artists in recovery do a great deal to help. Eric Clapton set up a rehab- Crossroads in Antigua. Which is great.

But here in Europe the industry needs to take more responsibilty and have a longer-term vision.

An artist who dies young is a loss to us all.