The music industry is full of larger-than-life personalities and tales of debauchery and eccentricity, and the public is generally willing to lap up every juicy detail it can find in tabloid magazines, interviews, autobiographies and, more recently, social media.
It's no surprise, then, that the secretive and scandalous nature of the music world has given rise to many outlandish myths and urban legends. Today, we'll look at ten of them.
10. Sniper John Denver
John Denver created an image of himself as a friendly, sweet and harmless folk musician who cared about nature and his fellow man. But was it all a lie? Was John Denver really a cold-blooded killer who once served as a sniper in the US Army?
Well, no, but that didn't stop the story from spreading online. It's true that he came from a military family, and his father was an Air Force officer. USA . Denver may have wanted to follow in his footsteps, but it was never in the plans—his eyesight was too poor to become a pilot. He was also missing two toes, having lost them in a lawn mower accident , when he was a teenager. So, although John Denver did receive call-up notice to the army In 1964, due to health issues, he was classified as a 1-Y, meaning he was only eligible to serve in times of war or national emergency. So John Denver never served in any branch of the military. And even if he had, the fact that he was blind as a bat meant that the only position he would never have held was that of a sniper.
9. On air tonight
Fans often argue about the true meaning of some of their favorite songs, especially when that meaning isn't revealed in the lyrics or the artist's delivery. Take that overenthusiasm and uncertainty, mix them together, and you've got a surefire recipe for rumors. Take the song Phil Collins In the Air Tonight . It was his first solo single and has become one of his signature songs, but some of his fans still don't understand what the song is actually about.
There are several variations of this story, but the most common version claims that Collins once witnessed a man drown , while a third man looked on impassively, refusing to help the dying man. Phil himself was either too far away, too drunk, or too young to help, depending on which version you prefer. But that's not all, because the most outlandish retellings go even further and claim that Collins hired a detective to track down the mysterious man who had callously let another man drown. The musician then sent him tickets to one of his shows and during the concert brought him to the attention of the world at large.
This is all nonsense, of course, as Phil Collins himself made clear many years ago. He wrote the song after the breakup of his first marriage, but here's what Phil had to say:
“When I wrote this, I was going through a divorce. And the only thing I can say about him is that he’s clearly angry. That’s the angry side or the bitter side of separation. So what makes it even funnier is that I hear these stories that started years ago, especially in America, of someone coming up to me and saying, ‘Did you actually see someone drown?’ I said, "No, that's wrong. ".
8. Avril is dead
You've probably heard of the "Paul the Dead" myth - that the real Paul McCartney died decades ago and was replaced by a lookalike, and for some reason the Beatles decided to leave clues to their little coup on the album cover. Abbey Road This urban legend is too well known, so we decided to focus on another story about a celebrity doppelganger - Canadian pop-rocker Avril Lavigne.
According to this particular conspiracy theory, the real Avril died back in 2003, shortly after she achieved success with her debut album. Let Go But even before her death, Lavigne was not a fan of her newfound fame, so she sometimes used a stunt double named Melissa Vandella for various events. Then, after the singer's death, her record company didn't want to let go of a good thing, so they "upgraded" Melissa to the full-time Avril Lavigne. And, of course, the new Avril started leaving clues to her true identity in her songs, and even wrote the word "Melissa" on her hand once in a commercial frame .
Faced with this “irrefutable evidence,” the singer had no choice but to come clean and admit that she wasn’t the real Avril Lavigne… Just kidding. No, she mostly ignored the story, although in recent years she has acknowledged it more, dismissing it as “ stupid internet rumor ", composed by bored people who needed something new to talk about.
7. Jim is alive
This is pretty much the polar opposite of the previous entry – a rumor that claims a dead musician is actually still alive after faking his own death. Elvis is undoubtedly the king of this particular urban legend, with dozens, perhaps even hundreds of sightings over the years. Once again, we won’t focus on the most obvious choice, but instead will look at the idea that Jim Morrison, lead singer of The Doors, faked his death and started a new life.
The murky circumstances of Morrison's death have given rise to rumours and conspiracies. The musician died suddenly in his Paris apartment in 1971 after joining the dreaded 27 Club, but more on that later. The probable cause of death was a drug overdose, but his partner Pamela Courson , fearing that she might be arrested and charged, gave a false statement to the French police, telling them that Morrison had died of a heart attack. With no signs of foul play, the authorities dismissed the need for an autopsy, and Jim Morrison was hastily buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery, with his fans informed of the singer's death after the funeral.
Over the years, conspiracy theories have claimed that Morrison was the victim of various assassination plots, or that he actually overdosed in a trendy Parisian nightclub and his body was taken home to avoid unwanted publicity. And then, of course, there was the idea that Jim had faked the whole thing and was starting over, leaving his old life behind. Oddly enough, some of his close friends also believed this, including Ray Manzarek , the Doors keyboardist who co-founded the group with Morrison.
6. Monkeys > The Beatles and the Stones
If you ever dare to tarnish the good name of the Monkees, you’ll probably find at least one fan who will angrily inform you that the Monkees actually sold more records in 1967 than the Beatles and the Rolling Stones combined. So… what can you say to that? Well, you could tell them that while their passion is commendable, they’re a little misinformed. While this “fact” has been repeated often over the decades, it was completely made up by Monkees member Mike Nesmith, who later called it “a complete lie.” fiction , a completely fake class A lie."
It wasn’t until 2015 that Nesmith set the record straight on a podcast, and then again in his autobiography. It all started in 1977, during an interview in Australia. Weary of media appearances and a little press-weary, Nesmith flat-out warned his interviewer that he would be lying to him and that he would have to do some research to separate fact from fiction. But here are Nesmith’s own words:
"Then there came a time when he asked me about Monkees record sales, and I saw an opportunity. It's not well known, I said bluntly, that in 1967 we sold over thirty-five million records. More than the Beatles and the Rolling Stones combined... chose a lie too outrageous to tell, but it turned out to be just right.
The next day it was in the newspaper printed as fact ".
5. Jimmy the Parrots
You may not know this, but the UK has a problem with feral parrots, particularly ring-necked parrots. They are a non-native species, and they are also non-migratory. This means that they didn’t just fly in from Africa or India on their own. Someone brought them to Britain and released them into the wild, where they thrived and multiplied. And if the story is to be believed, the blame lies squarely on the shoulders of one man… Jimi Hendrix .
Why was it his fault? Because, apparently, in 1968, while on a trip to London, he let a couple of Carnaby Street . This may or may not have happened, no one knows for sure, but even if it had, Hendrix would not have been responsible for their introduction as a non-native species. Casual sightings of the parrots in Britain date back to the 19th century, and the first large-scale release of the birds may have occurred in the early 1930s, during an outbreak of ‘parrot fever’. which has prompted many parrot owners to release their feathered friends into the wild.
Experts believe there have been several such instances where the parrots were released in large numbers, eventually leading to them becoming a feral species in the UK, with the most significant perhaps being the Great Storm of 1987, which saw damage across the country birdhouses .
4. High at Buckingham Palace
The Beatles were the quintessential counterculture movement of the 1960s, and according to legend, they staged one of their most infamous acts of rebellion in 1965 while high on drugs at Buckingham Palace .
Like Mike Nesmith's above-mentioned claim, this was a rumour started by one of the band members. In 1965, the Beatles went to Buckingham Palace where Queen Elizabeth II awarded them all MBEs, or Members of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. However, according to John Lennon, the Fab Four prepared for their meeting with the Queen by sneaking into the bathroom andhaving smoked a joint to calm the nerves.
So, were the Beatles high when they met the Queen? Lennon's other bandmates dismissed his claim, with both McCartney and Harrison pointing out that they were simply smoking regular cigarettes. And Lennon himself eventually retracted his claim, so it seems that this controversial moment in their career was all just a made-up story.
3. Roller Coaster Scream
It all started with a scream. There are countless songs that feature screams, but for some reason, the Ohio Players' 1975 hit Love Rollercoaster turned out to be different. Rumors began to circulate that the funk group had unwittingly recorded the murdered woman's last scream.
How could this even happen? Well, apparently the woman was killed right outside the studio, or maybe in another room, or even in the apartment next door, right at the moment when the band was recording Love Rollercoaster The scream comes about halfway through the song, it's barely audible and fairly easy to miss, which further convinced people that it was recorded by accident.
In other variations of the urban legend, the woman was not killed, but simply severely scalded with hot honey. In this case, the scream belonged to model Esther Cordet, who posed naked for the album cover, dripping honey on herself. However, it's a little unclear how this ended up on the record.
The truth was far more obvious and down-to-earth. The scream wasn't unintentional, and it wasn't even from a woman. It was made by the Ohio Players' keyboardist. Billy Beck , who just wanted to add something special to the track. And to his credit, he didn't do what he intended.
2. Let him bleed
Even in a world filled with excess, Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is in a league of his own, as his decades of drug abuse are well documented. But why is Keith Richards still alive and kicking, while many of his contemporaries have long since passed away living the exact same lifestyle? Is he simply immortal, or does he have another trick up his sleeve? Well, if the rumors are to be believed, the secret to Keith Richards’ long life is replacement of all blood in his body with fresh blood.
Yes, it is claimed that the musician went to one of those super-expensive, super-secret medical clinics somewhere in the Swiss Alps and underwent a full blood transfusion to kick his heroin habit. It's a strange situation, because several people close to Richards confirmed the rumors were true, only for Richards himself to eventually admit that he made the whole thing up out of boredom. Here's what he said:
"Someone asked me how I cleaned up, so I told them I went to Switzerland and completely changed my blood… I was just goofing around. I unzipped my jacket and said, 'How do you like my blood change?
It was all a joke. I'm so damn tired of answering this question. So I told them the story ".
1. Club 27
What do Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse have in common? They are all part of a cursed Club 27 , a mysterious "statistical blip" that has claimed the lives of famous musicians at the tender age of 27 in far greater numbers than at any other age.
Jimi, Janis and Jim died within two years of each other. They were all very successful and influential, and they were all 27 years old, so people did notice the eerie similarities between them, but it wasn’t until the 90s when Kurt Cobain died that the idea of the 27 Club became a well-defined concept, and people thought of it again in 2011 when Amy Winehouse died. These are just the biggest names that are mentioned whenever the 27 Club is mentioned, but there are others like Rolling Stones founder Brian Jones, blues pioneer Robert Johnson, Canned Heat singer Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson, Grateful Dead member Ron “Pigpen” McKernan . , and many others.
So is it true that musicians are more likely to die at 27? Not according to science. One study looked at the deaths of more than 11,000 musicians over the age of 60, and only 1.3 percent died at that age. In fact, more died at 28, and, unsurprisingly, the percentage increased with age, with the 55 to 65 age range showing the highest risk. The deadly Of all of them, '56 was the worst, accounting for 2.3 percent of deaths. However, it was only slightly higher than previous years, not enough to be considered a spike of any significance.
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