July 3rd marks a day for rock history unlike any other, marking the departure of two of the 60s biggest icons. It was July 3rd, 1969 that the world would hear about the death of Brian Jones at the ripe age of 27 shortly after stepping out of the Rolling Stones for the first time since he put the band together back in 1962. The death was, to say the least, tragic to the youth who had once seen Jones as an immovable figure of their culture. To see him become painted into the laundry list of tragedy the decade had bred was unthinkable, but to see it happen to a man so young, with so much of a life to still lead put an even more sinister spin on the already dire state his passing left. It was July 3rd, 1971 that Jim Morrison would be found dead in Paris, France. At the age of 27. Only two short years to the day of the passing of Brian Jones, and mere months after the deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin [both 27 at the time of their deaths]. The full realization of the 27 Club wouldn’t come until April 5th, 1994, the day Kurt Cobain would take his own life at the same age. It would be hauntingly fixed into culture July 23rd, 2011 with the untimely passing of Amy Winehouse at 27.
The first member of the 27 Club is Robert Johnson. There’s a folk story of the man, that he sold his soul to the devil to become one of the greatest blues musicians in the world, that his untimely death from poisoning was the price he paid for his talents, the real exchange as opposed to his soul. There’s less than 50 recorded songs of Johnsons, but he remains revered as one of the most influential and important musicians of his time. There was no written cause of his death, no autopsy ever done, and it was only decades after his passing would there be any record of his death certificate being seen. He died in 1938, buried in an unmarked grave. The second member of the club would be Brian Jones, nearly thirty years later. Some argue that his cause of death is up for debate but to go on the facts he drowned in his swimming pool after presumably mixing drugs and alcohol and having no supervision. Some venture to claim there was sabotage in his death, that he made enough enemies over his life to have at least four suspects, instead of believing his death could at any point be a result of his own careless mistakes. It was September 18th, 1970 that Jimi Hendrix would die due to an accidental overdose on sleeping pills. Less than two weeks later, Janis Joplin would be found dead in a hotel room due to a heroin overdose. Five months later, Jim Morrison would be found dead in the bathtub of his girlfriend Pamala Courson from heart failure [some claim heroin overdose, but the official story at the time being remains heart failure]. It was 1994 when Kurt Cobain would be found dead, self inflicted, at the age of 27, and 2011 Amy Winehouse would be found unresponsive in her home with a blood-alcohol level was five times the legal limit.
There have been countless other members of the 27 Club, creatives who all shockingly died at the same age in tragic ways, remaining hounded by the press even in death. It was the string of Hendrix, Joplin, and Morrison that would lend a true legend to music' most exclusive club. Even in their time they stood tall, living legends before the prefix was dropped. There was no one comparable to Hendrix on guitar, Joplin with her voice, or Morrison with his words in their own short lives, let alone in history before or after them. Decades have passed and no has come to fill the gaps that loom large in wake of those who once redefined the world in them. 27 years is already a short time to leave an irreplaceable legacy, but combined with the fact that nearly every member's professional career only lasted five or less years makes these accomplishments even more impressive. One thing that has happened to each of these artists, almost even more shocking than dying at the same age from the same profession, is the peace in which none of them ever felt.
Johnson's legacy is marked with rumors of how his talent was never human, that he sold his soul to become as good as he was, and died with no one writing down his genuine cause of death. Jones was belittled by everyone around him for his incompetence when it came to being a professional, and was replaced before he ever died, a tribute to him being a poem read quick at a free concert before the next era was ushered in for the band that never stops. Hendrix may well be the only exception to this rule - he was rather beloved in life and in death, remaining revered for his stellar work by pretty much anyone with ears as the greatest guitar player to ever live. Joplin recalled her early life in an interview with Dick Cavett just four months before she died, saying how she was made fun of at school and laughed out of her home town, in death she is revered but in life she was tormented for those very things shes commended for now. She died alone, her friend and fiancé abandoning her on the day she seemingly needed them most, a horrible end. Morrison was tormented by authority that hated him without reason much of his professional life, he was a man who struggled that very few ever cared to acknowledge. His death in Paris came when he was finally away from the fame that was making him so unhappy, he was free for a shortwhile before time caught up. In death, his memorial is vandlized, though he may not have minded that. A bust of him was stolen after a few years and never replaced. Cobain was struggled his entire life, finding an outlet in music for his pain. Nirvana became the next big thing, he was everywhere, hailed as the second coming of Jesus Christ - a fate he never wanted. At times, his iconography overshadowed himself, his band, his music. When he chose to end his life, there was suddently hoards of people jumping to name his widow, the woman he loved, as the perpetrator, or call him selfish for the choice due to his newborn. To this day people discuss Cobain as a godlike figure, even if he may have never hoped for that outcome. Winehouse was suffering from a drug and alcohol addiction. She was never left alone during her fame - torn apart for her apperence, her addictions became the butt of jokes as opposed to treated like the illness it was - and it slowly killed her. In death she's never rested, held up as a lost cause not a reflection of the horrors the media's treatment of women can cause. Just this year, a year where the 27 Club was discussed at large with April marking the 30th year without Kurt Cobain, was there a film released about Amy. She has not yet been dead for fifteen years and she is once more profited off of and exploited. All of the Club was been exploited, their short lives and subsquent death's becoming entertainment as opposed to warnings.
So much of rock and roll mythology is created in the idea of youth, the genre is born of its rebellion after all. It’s what leads the culture the surrounds the genre as well, how often rock acts seem to become parody as the years go on - how the skinny jeans, dyed hair, and women much too young become seen as embarrassing at best and sad at worst. Yet those who adopt their older persona, age how anyone should, are labeled as sellouts. In some ways, those who died young had the easiest way out - even if they have become markers for the horrors of fame, fortune, and the overbearing weight of greatness thrust upon young artists' shoulders the second they get an ounce of fame. How Hendrix was the greatest of all time while still alive, Janis was blues legend at the ripe age of 24, Morrison a symbol of all to be hated in youth, Jones a legend of no comparison at no more than 21 after becoming the original marketer for what would become one of the biggest bands of all time. How at 25 Kurt Cobain was to have all the answers for a generation of kids no older than himself, become a voice of his generation that he never asked to be, or how Amy couldn’t become clean without thousands of cameras and commentary on each mistake she made. Artists come into the world sensitive people, people who put pen to paper to articulate what their heart feels and in turn speak for those who can’t put the words together. They represent a silent majority. Fran Lebowitz once wrote “Music makes people happier and doesn’t harm them. Most things that make you feel better are harmful. It’s very unusual. It’s like a drug that doesn’t kill you.” which is true - it doesn’t harm the listener. Then, to juxtapose the quote just used, let’s look to Raidohead’s 1997 song No Surprises: A heart that’s full like a landfill / A job that slowly kills you / Bruises that won’t heal, you look so tired, unhappy, lines that talk to the artist, the person the drug of art kills. It’s not black and white like that though - nothing is. Youth isn’t either, it’s a time most wish to never relive, it’s walls choc full of the worst decisions and moments that shaped them. But for those who never escape the fleeting years of their youth, they are forever trapped within that world of pain, and the work they made through and about that pain. That’s the tragedy of the 27 Club, that their work and short lives can never be divorced from their pain.
Don’t you think it’s wise sometimes not to grow up? is crooned in The Rolling Stones 100 Years Ago and captures the 27 Club near perfect. That even with the pain and tragedy laced between each song and story of these individuals, in their short time on Earth they were able to make waves, breed conversations about art unlike anyone before them, and become irreplaceable. While melded to their pain, there inablity to grow old has proved to be a cultural fixture. How a legend who only had a spotlight for four years never ceases to be a legend - living or otherwise. That's the 27 Club.
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