Five Famous Rock Stars Killed by Alcohol

When we think of rocks stars dying young – people like Kurt Cobain, Layne Staley, Phil Lynott or Janis Joplin – it's usually because of hardcore drug use and it's a long, long list of those who departed. But many rock stars have died way too young because of their addiction to alcohol and drinking. Here are five famous rockers who died from the bottle

John Bonham

Led Zeppelin's drummer and resident fun guy, John Bonham died on Sept. 25, 1980 at the age of 32. Bonham was well-known for his drinking prowess, and ultimately, it cost him his life. With the band gathered at guitarist Jimmy Page's house for US tour rehearsals, Bonzo began binging early in the day on Sept. 24. He was still going into the evening until he finally passed out. He was put to bed by his and Page's assistant, but never woke up. The bands manager tried to wake him in the morning, but found no pulse. Bonham ended up choking on his own vomit and his death was ruled accidental. Reports showed he'd consumed the equivalent of 40 ounces of vodka in 12 hours. Bonham's death marked the end of Led Zeppelin.

Bon Scott

Just as AC/DC was reaching the top of the hard rock mountain in 1980, the band found itself without a singer after Bon Scott choked to death on his vomit on Feb. 19, 1980. The band was working on the Back in Black album in London. On the night of Feb. 18, he and Alistair Kinnear were drinking in a pub called the Music Machine. The story goes Scott passed out in Kinnear's car on the way home, so Kinnear left the singer in the vehicle. Scott threw up in his sleep and choked to death. The coroner deemed he died because of acute alcohol poisoning. He was 33 years old. Brian Johnson replaced him in AC/DC on April 1 and Back in Black was released in July, 1980.

Steve Clark

Steve Clark was Def Leppard's guitarist and one of their main songwriters. He was a longtime alcoholic who had been trying to sober up when he died on Jan. 8, 1991 at the age of 30. At the time, he was on an official leave of absence from the band so he could get cleaned up. However, he would never play with Def Leppard again. Clark died in his Chelsea home after a night at the local pub. He died in his sleep and an autopsy confirmed the cause of death was compression of the brain stem - which caused respiratory failure - due to excessive alcohol mixed with anti-depressants and pain killers.

Jeff Hanneman

Like Steve Clark, Jeff Hanneman is another guitarist who died too young. The Slayer co-founder was 49 when he lost his life due to alcohol-related cirrhosis of the liver, on May 2, 2013. But it was a spider bite which ultimately led to Hanneman's demise. A couple of years before he died, he developed necrotizing fasciitis (flesh eating disease) in his arm. It was treated with antibiotics, but Hanneman simply couldn't play guitar the way he wanted to anymore. That led to him drinking more and more, going into a tailspin (he'd also been drinking heavily since his father died in 2008). Hanneman died in hospital.

Jani Lane

Many will remember Lane as the lead singer for 1980s metal band Warrant. August 11, 2011 from acute alcohol poisoning. The man who wrote "Cherry Pie" was found dead alone at a Comfort Inn in Woodlands, Calif., surrounded by bottles of booze and containers of prescription pills. He embraced alcohol and the rock lifestyle even long after the short-lived fame of his band, but did make attempts to sober up. He even went on the VH1 reality show Celebrity Fit Club 2. But he was never able to put down his demons. Lane was 47 years old.

Read about how former AC/DC vocalist Bon Scott got his distinctive voice

The Five Most Underrated Led Zeppelin Songs

When you look at their impressive career from 1969-1979, Led Zeppelin cranked out plenty of well known and loved songs like "Stairway to Heaven" and "Whole Lotta Love", but many of their best tracks are actually the most underrated and least well known. Here's our look at the five most underrated songs from all their studio albums, excluding 1982's CODA, which was released after the band had parted ways following the death of drummer John Bonham in 1980.

Achilles Last Stand (Presence, 1976)

The opening song on what many consider a lacklustre Presence album, Achilles Last Stand is more than 10 minutes of Led Zeppelin thundering along in an epic track that paved the way for the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. Written by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant at Page's Malibu home, the band recorded it in 1975 in Munich at Musicland Studios. Of interest on this song, besides' John Bonham's stellar drumming, is John Paul Jones' use of a custom eight-string bass. Jimmy Page added no less than 12 guitar tracks to the song and orchestrated the guitar parts. This song, with it's relentless energy, virtually crowns Led Zeppelin at their peak.

Custard Pie (Physical Graffiti, 1975)

Boasting a stellar Jimmy Page riff and incredible work by John Bonham that carries the song, "Custard Pie" kicks off the double Physical Graffiti album in a big way. The infectious, funky groove will instantly have your feet tapping, while Robert Plant is at his sexual double-entendre best singing about a woman's vagina. Written by Page and Plant, the singer also handles the harmonica that adds a solid blues element to the riff. Interestingly, Zeppelin never played it live.

The Rover (Physical Graffiti, 1975)

The second track on the Physical Graffiti album is one of those songs that flies under the radar. But from the moment John Bonham kicks it in with the opening drum passage, "The Rover" shows why it's among Zeppelin's best work. It was recorded in 1972 and originally intended to go on the Houses of the Holy album, but the band held it off that record. Robert Plant puts his heart and soul into it, just listen to him sing "You got me rockin when I ought to be a-rollin. Darling, tell me darling which way to go". Page's fretboard work is sound as always, and he used several overdubs to thicken his guitar sound on the track.

The Ocean (House of the Holy, 1973)

"The Ocean" closes out the impressive Houses of the Holy record with John Bonham counting it in "We've done four already but now we're steady and they went 1, 2, 3, 4 ...." as the band supposedly cracks it on the fifth take. It's a fun, funky song where you can tell the group is having a ton of fun playing it. The ending coda features some cool doo-wop grooving (with John Paul Jones and Bonham providing vocals) while Page solos merrily along. Near the end, Plant goes "Oh soo good" and yes, this song is oh. so. good. It was written by the entire band.

Bron-Y-Aur Stomp (Led Zeppelin III, 1970)

Named after the 18th Century Bron-Y-Aur house in Wales where the band wrote most of the songs for Led Zeppelin III, this acoustic track features John Bonham playing spoons and castanets, while John Paul Jones incorporates a fretless bass as the song grooves along nicely. Jimmy Page carries it with a superb sounding acoustic riff that connotes the pastoral side the band found writing at the house, which had no electricity or running water.

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Check out our in-depth look at the making and recording of Led Zeppelin IV

Making and Recording Led Zeppelin IV

There's no question Led Zeppelin IV is one of the most iconic rock albums ever recorded.

Since its release way back in 1971, the album continues to be one of the top-selling albums, year after year (more than 37 millions copies sold worldwide).

Guitarist Jimmy Page, who produced it, vocalist Robert Plant, bassist John Paul Jones and drummer John 'Bonzo' Bonham needed only four months in the studio to produce the piece that catapulted them into the stratosphere among the biggest rock stars in the world.

In late Nov. 1970, the band set themselves up at Headley Grange (after a recommendation on the place from Fleetwood Mac), on old three-story poorhouse in Hampshire, U.K. that was built in 1795. The band brought in the Rolling Stones mobile studio and engineer Andy Johns to handle the sounds, since he was familiar with the mobile truck setup after working with the Stones. They also worked on a few songs, including "Black Dog" at Island Studios in London.

The house had no distractions and the band was under no pressure to finish in a specific time period, so the working conditions were ideal and the finished product reflects that.

Jimmy Page told BBC's "Classic Albums" that the band members would sit around and ask if Jones had anything to contribute songwise, because, up to that time, it was Page and Plant bringing forth most of the ideas and pieces for songs.

"We were always trying to encourage him to come up with bits and pieces so to speak, cause that's usually what they were, he never came up with a complete whole song or anything, (until 'In Through the Out Door')," Page told BBC. "But he had this great riff with "Black Dog" and I added some sections to it as well, and then we had the idea actually, I must be totally honest, I suggested, how you get the breaks with the vocals. That's it, I've finally owned up as no one else will in the band, but that was the idea to give it the vocal thing then the riffs in."

All of the basic tracks were recorded at Headley Grange, while Page added guitar overdubs in Ireland.

"We had the drums in the hall and sometimes the drums were in the room as well, (in the sitting room with the fireplace) and the amplifiers were all over," said Page. "When Bonzo was in the hall, Jones and I were out there with earphones, the two sets of amps were in the other rooms and other parts such as cupboards and things. A very odd way of recording, but it certainly worked. When you've got the whole live creative process going on, that's how things like "Rock and Roll" come out."

Certainly the drum sound on the record is phenomenal and "Rock 'N Roll" was recorded in a couple of takes, showing how in sync the band was at the time.

Capturing Drums on "When the Levee Breaks"

Headley Grange

The now-famous drums from "When the Levee Breaks" came about from an idea Page and Johns had at Headley.

"Having worked in the studios for so long as a session player, I had been on so many sessions where the drummer was stuck in a little booth and he would be hitting the drums for all he was worth and it would just sound as though he was hitting a cardboard box," said Page. "I knew that drums would have to breath to have that proper sound, to have that ambiance. So, consequently we were working on the ambiance of everything, of the instruments, all the way through. I guess this is the high point of this album. You've got something like "When the Levee breaks" which was with Bonzo in the hall and on the second landing was a stereo mike and that's all there was."

Songs like "Going to California" and "Misty Mountain Hop" came together fairly quickly out of the band noodling around on different chords.

While many of the songs came easily, "Four Sticks" was a labour of love that took some time until it was up to snuff for Page. He tells a great story of how it was finally finished and how the song got its title.

"We tried that on numerous occasions and it didn't come off until the day Bonzo, who was just playing with two sticks on it and we tried all different things, then one day he picked up two sets of sticks, so he had four sticks, and we did it," said Page. "That was two takes, but that was because it was physically impossible for him to do another. I couldn't get that to work until we tried to record it a few times and I just didn't know what it was and I still wouldn't have known what it was. We probably would have kicked the track out, but then Bonzo went - and I'm not going to repeat the language he said at the time, but it was nothing to do with the fact that it was taking a long time. We had actually gone in to try on a fresh occasion and he just picked up the four sticks and that was it."

Jones had brought a mandolin to the house and Page would play around with it (having never played the instrument before) and ended up with "Battle of Evermore", a track featuring additional vocals by folk singer Sandy Denny, who Plant recommended come in and add her vocal styling to the song.

Zeppelin in 1970

For the most popular song on Led Zeppelin IV, "Stairway to Heaven", Page had to purchase that famous Gibson SG doubleneck, so he could do all the guitar parts on one instrument.

Once he had the idea for "Stairway", he said it was a bit of a chore getting the rest of the band into it.

"It may not make a lot of sense, but it was actually quite a complicated song to get across to everybody," said Page.

"I know one of the bits that was difficult for Bonzo at the time was the twelve string fanfare into the guitar solo and that took a bit of time," recalled Page. "We were going over and over it from the beginning to the end quite a few times, with Robert sitting on the stool listening and he must have got inspiration as he wrote these lyrics then. He said I think I've got some things for it. We had an old Revox tape recorder at that time and I remember there were a good 70 to 80% of the lyrics there."

The band was sued in 2014 by 1960s band Spirit for allegedly plagiarizing "Stairway" from their song "Taurus". However last year during the much-publicized trial, a jury quickly found Zeppelin did not lift anything from "Taurus".

First Mix of Zeppelin IV Goes Wrong

The record was first initially mixed at Sunset Studios in LA with Johns. But the mix was terrible, despite Johns having good luck there mixing albums for the Rolling Stones.

"As it turned out, mixing the album was an absolute disaster," said Johns in an interview on musicradar.com. "It all sounded great at Sunset, but the only mix that got used was When The Levee Breaks. That, for some reason turned out alright. But we did this playback at Olympic Studios in London and it wasn't the greatest place to hold a playback session. I should have chosen Island. Anyway the first song goes by and it doesn't sound very good at all. Jimmy and I are sitting on the floor with heads in our hands going 'What the hell is this?' Then we played the next one and the next one… and it all sounded 'orrible."

So, basically, the album had to be mixed a second time at Island Studios, delaying the release until November, 1971. And Johns never worked with Zeppelin again after that.