4 ms·

The price of fame? Mortality risk among famous singers

41 points by ingve 10mo ago

hackeraccount 10mo ago
I don't have time to read the article but did they do a control? I would be interested - and this speaks to my prior beliefs - about the life expectancy of people who tried to become famous. In other words something like compare the life expectancy of people who don't play the lottery vs. people who win and then add in people who play as much as the winners but never win.
- wanderingstan 10mo ago
  It’s the 2nd paragraph: > Methods We used a retrospective matched case–control design in a preregistered study to compare famous singers with matched less famous singers (total N=648) based on the matching criteria of gender, nationality, ethnicity, genre and solo/band status. We compared mortality risk using a Kaplan-Meier curve and used a Cox regression to test the effect of fame.
- Forgeties79 10mo ago
  It’s like a 5min read.
geocrasher 10mo ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/27_Club https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/27_Club The 27 Club is an informal list consisting mostly of popular musicians who died at age 27. Although the claim of a "statistical spike" for the death of musicians at that age has been refuted by scientific research, it remains a common cultural conception that the phenomenon exists, with many celebrities who die at 27 noted for their high-risk lifestyles.
- worik 10mo ago
  Yes I prefer this sort of story to a scientific study!
anovikov 10mo ago
27 is the age beyond which one can't pass for a teen icon anymore, and those who can't reinvent themselves in any other way see that they are facing the end.
mmmmmbop 10mo ago
It is not stated explicitly in the article, but the implication seems to be that fame causes a higher mortality risk. Whereas my intuition is that there are traits that help you become famous (competitiveness, savant syndrome, prioritization of success over happiness, etc.) that also raise your mortality risk.
- bitshiftfaced 10mo ago
  I was the under the impression that this had to do with drug related deaths more than anything.
- conductr 10mo ago
  That’s probably a factor in some way but my intuition is it’s the lifestyle itself that’s the dominant risk. The control point is comparing to less famous musicians. I’d assume many of which have similar personality traits and desire for fame. But when it doesn’t materialize, their personality traits arent causing them to die early. The lifestyle of constantly partying, drugs, sex, little consequences, money, excess, etc. Versus the less famous musician who has to function like an adult, stresses over their mortgage, etc. Is sure to have a variance with respect to mortality.
  - wavemode 10mo ago
    Interestingly, some months ago there was a frontpage HN post, written by Charli xcx of all people: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46016613 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46016613 Goes into a lot of the realities of the surreal lifestyle
  - thijson 10mo ago
    I agree with this. Tony Hsieh (founder of Zappos) also ended up dead because of the lifestyle enabled by his wealth, and he wasn't a famous musician. The wealth also led to lots of hangers on around him that didn't care about his well being, just personally benefiting. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW87nhKZ8A0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW87nhKZ8A0
chistev 10mo ago
"We weren't supposed to make it past 25, jokes on you we still alive!"
vonnik 10mo ago
Becoming Led Zeppelin is a great documentary which chronicles the band’s rise. It has some great quotes from Plant about the milieu that fathers around a famous band, supplying drugs and sex. The substances lead to abuse, addiction and sometimes overdoses. LZ’s drummer Bonham choked in his own vomit during sleep after taking 40 shots. Page became addicted to several substances. Many famous singers if they survive are recovering from some form of addiction. Bowie, for example. There’s a culture they enter with fame and travel that is hard to escape.
- Miraltar 10mo ago
  Is it still true today?
  - reactordev 10mo ago
    Are you asking if a drug and sex fueled lifestyle is still pursued today by musicians? The answer sadly is yes. There are lots of musicians that don’t go full throttle but most of the highly famous ones are running the red line. This is the OP’s point. Whether it’s the person amplified by the lifestyle that makes them famous or it’s the fame that enables the lifestyle that allows them to destroy themselves. The road is littered with smashed guitars.
    - astrobe_ 10mo ago
      Speaking of roads, everyone points out lifestyle choices, but the lifestyle of popular bands/musicians is also countrywide or worldwide tours. It doesn't look like an easy life, so I wonder to what extend those excesses are related to being on the road maybe half of the year? I think this means no true social life for extended periods of time; not having people you value telling you that you're past that red line is one less safety. Also, artists in general are a peculiar profile I think. It's not only famous singers that take drugs, commit suicide etc. One can easily find many writers and painters, some of them even only became famous postmortem.
- rdiddly 10mo ago
  Yeah but then go watch the Rush documentary. Seems like if the band decides to just retire to their hotel rooms and read, there's none of that.
hirvi74 10mo ago
My childhood best friend is a touring a member of a relatively famous singer's band. I remember a discussion I had with him once about how soul-sucking it is to constantly be on the road. He was telling me how easy it is to just fall into a bad routine. He said you'd play a banger of a show one night, go back to the bus, have a few drinks and maybe some other substances. The next night, you play another banger, go back to the bus, have a few drinks, etc.. Next think you know, this is your everyday life. He was also telling me about how constantly being on tour comes with this unsettling feeling. You travel to a city, play a show, go to sleep, and might wake up in a completely different city, state, or country. He told me that he started to develop some kind of latent anxiety due to the bombardment of new places and experiences causing a lack of consistency and familiarity in which one often anchors their lives to.
- RickJWagner 10mo ago
  Bob Seger sang it in “Turn the Page”.
rbartelme 10mo ago
It's somewhat interesting, but the authors' conclusions are a bit odd given their data. They acknowledge that fame is potentially confounding: Risk factors (impulsivity, substance use, etc.) -> Fame achievement | Risk factors -> Early mortality The authors also appear to conclude that fame is semi-causal of the mortality risk. If, taking a causal statistical approach, the authors conditioned on the collider: Risk factors (substance use, personality traits, mental health vulnerabilities) -> Becoming/staying a professional singer <- Talent/drive toward fame I do applaud them for preregistering the study, but I think this paper needed a little more rigor in peer review.
- nonameiguess 10mo ago
  This particular design more or less can't tell us whether fame in and of itself is a risk factor. We'd need to look at a cross-section of professions, not just musicians. Do marquee leading actors die younger than character actors? Do national politicians die younger than local? Do best-selling authors die younger than struggling authors who publish but never sell anything? Do professional athletes in popular sports die younger than athletes in less popular sports? Mechanistically, it seems pretty obvious that fame can't cause a physical health outcome. I think the authors know this and they mention that it isn't really fame per se; it's the anxiety caused by public scrutiny and high expectations, often coped with by using illegal drugs to self-medicate. That isn't a worthless finding, but what are we supposed to take from this? I would imagine drug-using hard-partying rock stars know their lifestyle in unhealthy and dangerous, just as I am fairly certain you'd be able to produce a retrospective study showing wingsuit divers die younger than big wall rock climbers, and big wall rock climbers die younger than trail runners. Anyone doing these things knows the risk and does it anyway. It seems the effect they found is famous musicians die 4.6 years younger on average than comparable unknown musicians. If you told me I could be a rock star but I'd die at 81 instead of 85, I think I'm probably taking that. Of course, we know it doesn't actually work that way, more that a few die in their 20s, far more in their 40s and 50s, and anyone making it past that is probably dying about the same time as anyone else, but whatever the risk is, if that's the life you want, so be it.
  - rbartelme 10mo ago
phendrenad2 10mo ago
There's a conspiracy theory about this, that rappers are killed for insurance fraud because people will believe it's just gang violence. I'm just sharing this as an anthropological curiosity.
otikik 10mo ago
The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long.
lynx97 10mo ago
I know its kind of a conspiracy theory, and surely lifestyle dominates this statistic. But there is this plain fact that very famous artists actually generate more income for their label if they are actually dead. Makes you wonder.
ekianjo 10mo ago
Confounding factors for singers: heavy drug use, lower educational background leading to poor habits, various addictions - not sure if being "famous" itself is the right lens to look at it for proper insights here related to mortality.
silvandeboer 10mo ago
From the graph in the paper, it seems that once you make it till 60, the mortality rate is actually lower if you're famous. I'm guessing it's because the ones with an extreme lifestyle don't make it that far, and the famous singers have more money to spend on healthcare than the less famous singers.
- Jeff_Brown 10mo ago
  Also there's a widespread stress of "how will I get by?" among old people that rich people dodge. And the people who make it a long time have probably learned how to push back against agents pushing them to work too much. I keep thinking about Willie Nelson.
- jedberg 10mo ago
  > I'm guessing it's because the ones with an extreme lifestyle don't make it that far Keith Richards and Steven Tyler would like a word. :)
sizzzzlerz 10mo ago
Jimmi Hendrix, Janice Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Kobain, and Bon Scott would all fit the profile. All died young of substance abuse. But then we have Keith Richards which no one can explain.
- dylan604 10mo ago
  Keith is an alien. That should be sufficient explanation. I really hope he donates his body to science
  - sizzzzlerz 10mo ago
    When Keith goes, science, like the Universe itself, will be dead, cold, and gone.
- quesera 10mo ago
  Kurt Cobain died of a self-inflicted shotgun wound, and it's a stretch to blame that on heroin. He had lots of issues. (aside, and with good humor: it's interesting that all but one of the dead folks names are misspelled, and it's the least famous of the lot! :)

41 points by ingve 10mo ago

I don't have time to read the article but did they do a control? I would be interested - and this speaks to my prior beliefs - about the life expectancy of people who tried to become famous. In other words something like compare the life expectancy of people who don't play the lottery vs. people who win and then add in people who play as much as the winners but never win.

wanderingstan 10mo ago
It’s the 2nd paragraph: > Methods We used a retrospective matched case–control design in a preregistered study to compare famous singers with matched less famous singers (total N=648) based on the matching criteria of gender, nationality, ethnicity, genre and solo/band status. We compared mortality risk using a Kaplan-Meier curve and used a Cox regression to test the effect of fame.
Forgeties79 10mo ago
It’s like a 5min read.

geocrasher 10mo ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/27_Club https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/27_Club The 27 Club is an informal list consisting mostly of popular musicians who died at age 27. Although the claim of a "statistical spike" for the death of musicians at that age has been refuted by scientific research, it remains a common cultural conception that the phenomenon exists, with many celebrities who die at 27 noted for their high-risk lifestyles.

worik 10mo ago
Yes I prefer this sort of story to a scientific study!

anovikov 10mo ago

27 is the age beyond which one can't pass for a teen icon anymore, and those who can't reinvent themselves in any other way see that they are facing the end.

mmmmmbop 10mo ago

It is not stated explicitly in the article, but the implication seems to be that fame causes a higher mortality risk. Whereas my intuition is that there are traits that help you become famous (competitiveness, savant syndrome, prioritization of success over happiness, etc.) that also raise your mortality risk.

bitshiftfaced 10mo ago
I was the under the impression that this had to do with drug related deaths more than anything.
conductr 10mo ago
That’s probably a factor in some way but my intuition is it’s the lifestyle itself that’s the dominant risk. The control point is comparing to less famous musicians. I’d assume many of which have similar personality traits and desire for fame. But when it doesn’t materialize, their personality traits arent causing them to die early. The lifestyle of constantly partying, drugs, sex, little consequences, money, excess, etc. Versus the less famous musician who has to function like an adult, stresses over their mortgage, etc. Is sure to have a variance with respect to mortality.
- wavemode 10mo ago
  Interestingly, some months ago there was a frontpage HN post, written by Charli xcx of all people: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46016613 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46016613 Goes into a lot of the realities of the surreal lifestyle
- thijson 10mo ago
  I agree with this. Tony Hsieh (founder of Zappos) also ended up dead because of the lifestyle enabled by his wealth, and he wasn't a famous musician. The wealth also led to lots of hangers on around him that didn't care about his well being, just personally benefiting. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW87nhKZ8A0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW87nhKZ8A0

chistev 10mo ago

"We weren't supposed to make it past 25, jokes on you we still alive!"

vonnik 10mo ago

Becoming Led Zeppelin is a great documentary which chronicles the band’s rise. It has some great quotes from Plant about the milieu that fathers around a famous band, supplying drugs and sex. The substances lead to abuse, addiction and sometimes overdoses. LZ’s drummer Bonham choked in his own vomit during sleep after taking 40 shots. Page became addicted to several substances. Many famous singers if they survive are recovering from some form of addiction. Bowie, for example. There’s a culture they enter with fame and travel that is hard to escape.

Miraltar 10mo ago
Is it still true today?
- reactordev 10mo ago
  Are you asking if a drug and sex fueled lifestyle is still pursued today by musicians? The answer sadly is yes. There are lots of musicians that don’t go full throttle but most of the highly famous ones are running the red line. This is the OP’s point. Whether it’s the person amplified by the lifestyle that makes them famous or it’s the fame that enables the lifestyle that allows them to destroy themselves. The road is littered with smashed guitars.
  - astrobe_ 10mo ago
    Speaking of roads, everyone points out lifestyle choices, but the lifestyle of popular bands/musicians is also countrywide or worldwide tours. It doesn't look like an easy life, so I wonder to what extend those excesses are related to being on the road maybe half of the year? I think this means no true social life for extended periods of time; not having people you value telling you that you're past that red line is one less safety. Also, artists in general are a peculiar profile I think. It's not only famous singers that take drugs, commit suicide etc. One can easily find many writers and painters, some of them even only became famous postmortem.
rdiddly 10mo ago
Yeah but then go watch the Rush documentary. Seems like if the band decides to just retire to their hotel rooms and read, there's none of that.

hirvi74 10mo ago

My childhood best friend is a touring a member of a relatively famous singer's band. I remember a discussion I had with him once about how soul-sucking it is to constantly be on the road. He was telling me how easy it is to just fall into a bad routine. He said you'd play a banger of a show one night, go back to the bus, have a few drinks and maybe some other substances. The next night, you play another banger, go back to the bus, have a few drinks, etc.. Next think you know, this is your everyday life. He was also telling me about how constantly being on tour comes with this unsettling feeling. You travel to a city, play a show, go to sleep, and might wake up in a completely different city, state, or country. He told me that he started to develop some kind of latent anxiety due to the bombardment of new places and experiences causing a lack of consistency and familiarity in which one often anchors their lives to.

RickJWagner 10mo ago
Bob Seger sang it in “Turn the Page”.

rbartelme 10mo ago

It's somewhat interesting, but the authors' conclusions are a bit odd given their data. They acknowledge that fame is potentially confounding: Risk factors (impulsivity, substance use, etc.) -> Fame achievement | Risk factors -> Early mortality The authors also appear to conclude that fame is semi-causal of the mortality risk. If, taking a causal statistical approach, the authors conditioned on the collider: Risk factors (substance use, personality traits, mental health vulnerabilities) -> Becoming/staying a professional singer <- Talent/drive toward fame I do applaud them for preregistering the study, but I think this paper needed a little more rigor in peer review.

nonameiguess 10mo ago
This particular design more or less can't tell us whether fame in and of itself is a risk factor. We'd need to look at a cross-section of professions, not just musicians. Do marquee leading actors die younger than character actors? Do national politicians die younger than local? Do best-selling authors die younger than struggling authors who publish but never sell anything? Do professional athletes in popular sports die younger than athletes in less popular sports? Mechanistically, it seems pretty obvious that fame can't cause a physical health outcome. I think the authors know this and they mention that it isn't really fame per se; it's the anxiety caused by public scrutiny and high expectations, often coped with by using illegal drugs to self-medicate. That isn't a worthless finding, but what are we supposed to take from this? I would imagine drug-using hard-partying rock stars know their lifestyle in unhealthy and dangerous, just as I am fairly certain you'd be able to produce a retrospective study showing wingsuit divers die younger than big wall rock climbers, and big wall rock climbers die younger than trail runners. Anyone doing these things knows the risk and does it anyway. It seems the effect they found is famous musicians die 4.6 years younger on average than comparable unknown musicians. If you told me I could be a rock star but I'd die at 81 instead of 85, I think I'm probably taking that. Of course, we know it doesn't actually work that way, more that a few die in their 20s, far more in their 40s and 50s, and anyone making it past that is probably dying about the same time as anyone else, but whatever the risk is, if that's the life you want, so be it.
- rbartelme 10mo ago

phendrenad2 10mo ago

There's a conspiracy theory about this, that rappers are killed for insurance fraud because people will believe it's just gang violence. I'm just sharing this as an anthropological curiosity.

otikik 10mo ago

The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long.

lynx97 10mo ago

I know its kind of a conspiracy theory, and surely lifestyle dominates this statistic. But there is this plain fact that very famous artists actually generate more income for their label if they are actually dead. Makes you wonder.

ekianjo 10mo ago

Confounding factors for singers: heavy drug use, lower educational background leading to poor habits, various addictions - not sure if being "famous" itself is the right lens to look at it for proper insights here related to mortality.

silvandeboer 10mo ago

From the graph in the paper, it seems that once you make it till 60, the mortality rate is actually lower if you're famous. I'm guessing it's because the ones with an extreme lifestyle don't make it that far, and the famous singers have more money to spend on healthcare than the less famous singers.

Jeff_Brown 10mo ago
Also there's a widespread stress of "how will I get by?" among old people that rich people dodge. And the people who make it a long time have probably learned how to push back against agents pushing them to work too much. I keep thinking about Willie Nelson.
jedberg 10mo ago
> I'm guessing it's because the ones with an extreme lifestyle don't make it that far Keith Richards and Steven Tyler would like a word. :)

sizzzzlerz 10mo ago

Jimmi Hendrix, Janice Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Kobain, and Bon Scott would all fit the profile. All died young of substance abuse. But then we have Keith Richards which no one can explain.

dylan604 10mo ago
Keith is an alien. That should be sufficient explanation. I really hope he donates his body to science
- sizzzzlerz 10mo ago
  When Keith goes, science, like the Universe itself, will be dead, cold, and gone.
quesera 10mo ago
Kurt Cobain died of a self-inflicted shotgun wound, and it's a stretch to blame that on heroin. He had lots of issues. (aside, and with good humor: it's interesting that all but one of the dead folks names are misspelled, and it's the least famous of the lot! :)