Six musicians that nearly died on stage
Musicians and danger are two things that go hand in hand. Since the dawn of time, musicians of all different backgrounds and genres have lived life on the edge, pushing the boundaries of their bodies and society. From Elvis Presley to Keith Moon and even GG Allin, the tales of the most mythical musicians are brimming with highlights of them dancing with the devil and danger.
For a long time, danger was the name of the game to many of our favourite musicians, and whether it was authentic or not, it often served as a means of them selling records, a PR tool, as notoriety is a dish that the public lap up like a fish to water. When Aerosmith famously sang the line, “Living on the edge”, despite its actual context, the band crystallised the ethos that has for so long underpinned popular music.
Whilst many musicians have actively sought to live on the edge over their careers, some haven’t. Over the years, there have been many cases of figures having brushes with death when on stage due to factors entirely out of their control, and today that is what we’re concentrating on.
Join us, then, as we list six musicians that nearly died on stage.
Six musicians that nearly died on stage:
Keith Richards
What a surprise to find music’s most eminent hellraiser on the list. During a 1968 show in Sacramento, California, Richards was in the middle of performing ‘The Last Time’, but he noticed his microphone pointing the wrong way. The moment of his backing vocals were fast approaching, so he attempted to turn the mic stand around by hitting it with the neck of his guitar.
This was a catastrophic mistake. The microphone wasn’t grounded properly, so when the guitar impacted it, it became a lightning rod, sending an enormous electric pulse down the steel strings, rippling through his body.
A witness later recalled: “I was right there in the front row, in front of Keith, I saw the blue light. I literally saw Keith fly into the air backwards. I thought he was dead.”
Richards was rushed to hospital as he drifted in and out of consciousness, and for a time, things looked bleak, with the guitarist recalling overhearing a paramedic saying, “Well, they either wake up or they don’t”. However, the plucky guitarist survived and lived to cheat death another day.
Frank Zappa x 2
The inclusion of Frank Zappa on this list probably won’t surprise many, as, like Keith Richards, he also lived a life of mythic proportions. He had a brush with death while on stage on December 10th, 1971, when The Mothers of Invention were playing at The Rainbow Theatre in London.
When the group were in the middle of covering The Beatles’ classic ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’, 24-year-old Trevor Howell emerged from the crowd and pushed the frontman off stage, with Zappa crashing onto the concrete floor of the orchestra pit. Luckily for Zappa, you don’t mess with his fans, and the fleeing Howell was caught by a group of them that smelled blood, and he was detained backstage until the police arrived.
At the time, Zappa lay there unconscious, and unsurprisingly, the rumours of his death spread quickly. One witness remembered: “A chaotic scene ensued outside The Rainbow where the audience for the second concert were joined in the street by the audience from the first show. Wild rumours that Frank had been killed flashed through the massive crowd, and for upwards of at least an hour no one knew what was happening”.
It transpired that Zappa had fallen 15 feet when pushed from the stage, and in his 1989 memoir The Real Frank Zappa Book, The Mothers of Invention mastermind recalled: “The band thought I was dead…My head was over on my shoulder, and my neck was bent like it was broken. I had a gash in my chin, a hole in the back of my head, a broken rib, and a fractured leg. One arm was paralysed.”
Interestingly, this brush with death would have an effect on the rest of Zappa’s career. The fall also crushed his larynx, which greatly affected his vocal range, making it much huskier than ever before, best heard on the track ‘Cosmik Debris’.
As for Howell, he was swiftly charged with assault and malicious intent to commit bodily harm, and during his court hearing in March 1972, he revealed his reasons for the attack: “I did it because my girlfriend said she loved Frank.”
Although this brush with death changed the course of Zappa’s career, remarkably, it rounded off a week where the American musician had already had another run-in with Charon. Only days earlier, on December 4th, about 90 minutes into their set at the historic Montreux Casino in Switzerland, The Mothers of Invention and Zappa were forced to evacuate their fans from the building as the building randomly went up in flames and started falling apart.
Luckily everyone got out in time, but the building was left a smouldering shell of its former glory. The outbreak of the fire and the subsequent announcement can be heard on the 1992 bootleg Swiss Cheese/Fire.
Keith Moon
It’s also no surprise to see the late drummer of The Who, Keith Moon, on this list, as he invariably pushed the boundaries over his life and career. He would eventually meet his end due to in 1978, and five years earlier, he nearly kicked the bucket, in a strange sign of the tragedy to come.
Notoriously, he took what appeared to be tranquilisers before a Who show in Francisco, but it turned out to be PCP, making the drummer twice pass out during the performance behind the drum kit. The band’s crew couldn’t bring him around the second time, so they rushed him to the hospital, where he had his stomach pumped.
All was not lost, though. A fan, Scott Halpin, was invited from the audience to take Moon’s place and finish the show. As for the drummer, he recovered, and before too long, he’d be back doing what he did best.
Bill Berry
Former R.E.M. drummer Billy Berry enjoyed a stellar career with the Athens band, which saw them go from cult indie heroes to world-famous stadium-fillers. However, Berry’s life and career would take an unexpected turn on March 1st, 1995, during a show at the Patinoire Auditorium in Lausanne, Switzerland. He collapsed on stage in the middle of the set due to a ruptured brain aneurysm.
He did recover and rejoin the band but decided to leave for good in October 1997, as he knew this chapter of his life was over, not having the drive or enjoyment he once had in the band and having no desire to travel.
Speaking to VH-1’s Behind the Music, he explained: “I didn’t wake up one day and decide, ‘I just can’t stand these guys anymore’ or anything. I feel like I’m ready for a life change. I’m still young enough that I can do something else. I’ve been pounding the tubs since I was nine years old … I’m ready to do something else.”
James Hetfield
Even the indomitable frontman of Metallica has had an onstage brush with death. Over his career, Hetfield has been known for pushing his body to the limits and has checked himself into rehab on multiple occasions, yet, it was not this that threatened to end his time in this mortal coil, but onstage pyrotechnics.
When the thrash metal titans were performing in Montreal, Canada, in 1992, the frontman walked into one of the pyrotechnics that was going off, leaving him with second and third-degree burns. Luckily for him, he survived and is still rocking hard.
Chris Rea
One of the most recent examples, northeastern rocker Chris Rea collapsed onstage in 2017 in Oxford on the 35th date of his tour and nearly lost his life. It resulted from the stroke he had suffered the year before, meaning that he wasn’t in the best of states to be touring so extensively, but as the old adage goes, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”
Rea fell backwards in the middle of a song during the show and was sent to the hospital for treatment. He recovered and quickly resumed his career.
