Fame and the Price Paid

(TW: contains suicide, drug and alcohol misuse and cancer)

Some people fade out far too soon, some get to stick around a little longer. The recent death of Mark Lanegan has got me thinking about how so many musicians and actors die young, or at least a little before they really got old. Lanegan was fifty seven and as yet no cause of death has been announced. But with a lifetime of alcohol and drug use and a recent terrifying stint of covid, it’s hardly a surprise his ragged body gave up. He was a fairly well-established alcoholic by the age of twelve and started to use heroin as a way to control that, and so began a rush into an adult life of substance abuse.

After it was announced I realised how little of his music I actually knew, although the name was firmly fixed in my memory. I’ve been going through his back catalogue; he left us an extraordinary body of work. With his gentle speaking voice and soft humour, his talk with Marc Maron on his podcast from 2017 is a great overview of his life and it’s a joy to hear these two men really gel. But man, could he let rip in his music. He was complex, that’s for sure.

When Bowie died in 2016 it was the start of an avalanche of losses over that year and so many of them seemed too young. We were all shocked as he’d been very private in his last years of life and didn’t reveal his cancer diagnosis. But he kind of burst back into the spotlight with some amazing new music; it's a wonder none of us twigged! You rarely saw him without a ciggie in his hand. His death, for me at least, seemed to slightly overshadow all the others that followed. We were still spinning from the news when just four days later Alan Rickman died, it didn’t seem to get the time it needed. It was a terrible year and has sort of become a bit of a thing. It was a heavy time.

Lemmy died a few days before 2016 just after turning 70 from cancer and acute heart failure, but his lifetime of alcohol and drugs went a long way towards it. He maintained his habits to the end, though much reduced. Leonard Cohen also died this year but was an exception as he lived to be 82, and I’m glad of it. I think he could have kept on giving us gems if he’d gone on a little longer. In August 2016 my Mum died after five years of illness from cancer, but she at least made it into her late 70s. I can't help joining the dots in some way; it sort of eased the grief knowing I was not alone in it. Mum knew she was on her last legs and was glad to be going the same year as Bowie, it had a sort of cache, or coolness about it. She kept her wry humour right up to the end.

Everyone was shocked when Prince died in April 2016, at just fifty seven years old. It was a really odd and lonely sort of death for such a well-loved man. Reports show he was just shy of getting some help for his prescription drug problems. Then Christmas came around and while we were licking our wounds we heard the news of George Michael. He was the same age as I am now when he died and it’s hard not to be just a little bit freaked out by it. Both men had a history of drug and alcohol problems and both died as a result of them.

We also lost Carrie Fisher in 2016 at 60, and a day later her Mum, Debbie Reynolds. This felt like the saddest thing as they had a strange and largely estranged life, but they really came together in the end, becoming next door neighbours and supporting each other. In the documentary Bright Lights released shortly after their death you can really see how they put aside so much of the troubles that plagued them. No small thing! Carrie Fisher had long and well-documented issues with substance abuse and alcohol.

River Phoenix died from an overdose outside The Viper Room nightclub at just twenty-three years old. The autopsy report declared he died from acute multiple drug intoxication. Not known to be a regular user but hanging out with a group of musicians well known for it put the young and naive Phoenix in a dangerous situation; he wasn’t ready for the level of experimentation around him. His girlfriend, Samantha Mathis, was with him the night of his death and her accounts make for a fairly frightening read. It sounds like he was trying to impress the big boys, but the big boys, namely John Frusciante from Red Hot Chilli Peppers, had a fairly established heroin habit at this time, as did many others in attendance that fateful night. The poor kid didn’t stand a chance.

Heath Ledger was twenty eight when he died from an accidental overdose. He had a mind-boggling amount of prescription drugs in his system. Oxycodone for pain, hydrocodone for an ongoing cough, diazepam for anxiety, temazepam for insomnia, the tranquiliser Xanax and sedative doxylamine. Ledger also had a history of drug use. After his death speaking to Interview Magazine, Michelle Williams said that he’d experienced trouble sleeping: "For as long as I'd known him, he had bouts with insomnia. He had too much energy. His mind was turning, turning, turning – always turning".

So many celebrity deaths seem to arise from years of alcohol and drug battles. Some indirectly, some more absolute. For many fame is the flame that lights the fire, for others a safe house for the dysfunction of addiction. Whitney Houston was ravaged by bad company and drug misuse by the end of her all-too-short life; She died at forty eight from an accidental overdose. I question how accidental these kinds of deaths really are when someone has been pulled into such a self-destructive lifestyle. It can’t be easy to live up to everyone’s expectations all the time and the pressure is massive. It’s hard not to see how Houston’s life went from pop princess to chaos when Bobby Brown came on the scene, though one can only speculate.

And then there’s The 27 Club. An extraordinary and devastating list of musicians who died at that age.

Brian Jones ~ July 1969 ~ Drowning following years of drug and alcohol misuse

Jimi Hendrix ~ Sept 1970 ~ Asphyxiation brought on by barbiturate overdose

Janis Joplin ~ Oct 1970 ~ Heroin overdose compounded by alcohol

Dave Alexander ~ Feb 1975 ~ Pulmonary oedema linked to alcoholism

Jean Michel Basquiat ~ Aug 1988 ~ Heroin overdose

Kurt Cobain ~ April 1994 ~ Death by suicide after years of heroin addiction and media pressure

Kristen Plaff ~ June 1994 ~ Drug overdose

Amy Winehouse ~ July 2011 ~ Alcohol poisoning after years of alcohol and drug misuse

And there are more, so many more. We could examine the industry and hold it responsible. We could examine family history too. Ultimately it’s very hard to be sure what makes an addict and life in the spotlight can be a dangerous lure. Mia Zapata is the only one on that list who didn’t die as a result of drug or alcohol misuse, indirect or otherwise (there are loads of theories about the cause of Jim Morrison’s death). Her murder in 1993 was a huge shock to the Seattle music scene and created a dramatic shift change; no longer an invincible force with strong voices, it shattered the myth that strong women can’t be victims. It took ten years and advances in DNA forensic technology to find her killer, and his rap sheet is shocking.

As I finalise this article the sad news came across social media that Taylor Hawkins has died. Although I’m not a fan of the Foo Fighters musically, I do bloody love those blokes. They must be torn up. Hawkins is another who fought addictions in the past. He was just fifty years old.

There are often a lot of unanswered questions when somebody dies young, even with an explanation. It’s always so difficult to square up an early death. Promise all gone, hope dissolved to nothing. I feel the sting of the loss of those in the public eye who I loved. I’ve experienced a fair amount of personal loss, I started young and got the hang of it by my twenties. They came in their plenty and the connections varied from family to close friend to acquaintance and by way of drugs, alcohol, suicide and accidental death as well as a handful of natural causes. In my youth I was reckless and took risks, but as I've got older I’ve learned to really value my life. Getting old is a gift we don’t all get. Cherish it, enjoy it, LIVE it.

Written by Vonalina Cake

I’m Von Cake, a freelance photographer and writer. I’ve been writing for The Everyday since its inception and have really enjoyed the freedom to explore my journalistic desires through this medium. Most of my pieces are self explorations and reminiscences of my own life. Through this lens I can explore various cultures and movements. Even when I try not to, I often find myself in the writing. My dream is to be a photographer and writer full time and earn enough to live well from it. My favourite places to be are in the pit at the gig or in my writing chair at home. I was told to stop daydreaming out of the window a lot at school. Well...I never stopped. Keep dreaming.