Over the last few decades, the music industry has endured the loss of some of the most talented and beloved artists of all time. But who are these icons, how did they die, and just where are they buried? Here's the final resting place of these legendary rock stars.
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00Over the last few decades, the music industry has endured the loss of some of the most talented
00:05and beloved artists of all time. But who are these icons? How did they die? And just where
00:11are they buried? Here's the final resting place of these legendary rock stars.
00:16Arguably one of the greatest guitarists ever to walk the earth,
00:20Jimi Hendrix died at just 27 years old on September 18, 1970. Hendrix was found in a
00:26room at London's Samarkand Hotel belonging to his on-again, off-again romantic partner,
00:32Monica Dannemann. Details of the hours leading up to Hendrix's death are vague,
00:37with Dannemann and others having changed their accounts multiple times.
00:41Hendrix apparently took strong sleeping pills combined with red wine, which caused him to
00:46vomit but not wake up — until he ultimately choked to death. The coroner returned an open
00:51verdict on his death, however. Hendrix's burial was also a little contentious. In 1970, he was
00:58buried in a plot at the Greenwood Memorial Park Cemetery in his hometown of Renton, Washington,
01:04marked by a simple gravestone that read,
01:06"'Forever in our hearts.'"
01:08But in 1999, his family announced plans to build a 27-foot stone memorial in the cemetery,
01:14partly funded by fans, complete with granite pillars, a domed roof, and sculptures. Hendrix's
01:20friends protested that digging him up was disrespectful, but to no avail. In 2002,
01:26the memorial was completed, and Hendrix was moved there to lie alongside his father,
01:31stepmother, and grandmother.
01:34Jim Morrison was in rock star retirement when he died in his Parisian home on July 3,
01:391971. Like Hendrix, Morrison was just 27 when he died. The official story is that he was found
01:46dead in his bathtub from heart failure. But some supposed witnesses have since come forward
01:51to say that he may have fatally overdosed on heroin in a nightclub toilet cubicle,
01:56and was carried back to his apartment by a pair of drug dealers.
02:00Morrison's grave at Paris' Père Lachaise Cemetery is one of the most famous in the world,
02:06which is impressive when you consider that he's not the only prestigious name at that cemetery.
02:11Père Lachaise is also the eternal home of world-renowned figures including Oscar Wilde,
02:17Marcel Proust, Edith Piaf, and Frédéric Chopin. But the biggest crowds still gather to visit
02:24Morrison's impressive shrine, which includes a bronze plaque engraved with his name,
02:29date, and an ancient Greek epitaph chosen by his father that reads,
02:34Kata tan daimana ietu. This is usually roughly translated as
02:39true to his own spirit, but it could also mean true to his own demons,
02:43a potential reference to the troubles that drove Morrison to Paris in the first place.
02:48One of the most famous scousers in history, not to mention an icon of swingin' 60s London,
02:55John Lennon left his home country for New York in 1971. Having married the artist Yoko Ono two
03:01years earlier, Lennon hoped that the bustling, celebrity-filled city would shield him from the
03:06constant attention that came with having been a Beatle. Instead, nine years later,
03:10on December 8, 1980, Lennon was shot dead outside his home by Mark Chapman.
03:16"...and they went inside the gate and all of a sudden there were five, six shots and that was it."
03:20Chapman later said that he'd chosen to kill Lennon because of his fame,
03:24believing it would in turn bring him self-glory.
03:28On October 9, 1985, Lennon's 45th birthday, an area of Central Park was dedicated to the
03:35musician. Lennon had enjoyed many walks in the tranquil space. Renamed Strawberry Fields,
03:41in tribute to one of Lennon's favorite Beatles songs, it features a mosaic with the word
03:46Imagine at the center, which was presented as a gift by the city of Naples, Italy.
03:50Ono herself was involved in the creation of the memorial,
03:53and it's believed that she scattered Lennon's ashes in the area.
03:57The Beatle George Harrison spent nearly four years being treated for cancer,
04:02before dying at age 58 on November 29, 2001. He had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 1997,
04:10and then with lung cancer in 1999. That year, he also survived being stabbed multiple times
04:16by a home intruder. In 2001, Harrison had surgery to treat the lung cancer and underwent more
04:23radiation to treat a brain tumor, but ultimately died from the disease.
04:27Harrison was a follower of the Hare Krishna movement, a branch of Hinduism. In accordance
04:32with Hindu beliefs, he was cremated shortly after his death at the Hollywood Forever Memorial Park.
04:38Hare Krishna's spokesman told the press that Harrison's wife Olivia and son Dhani would be
04:43scattering his ashes in the Ganges. This is a sacred river in Hindu theology, located in Varanasi,
04:50India. Crowds of fans and press headed to the city, only for the society to retract
04:56its previous comments. It's believed that Harrison's family did scatter his ashes in the river,
05:01but that they waited until they could do it more privately.
05:05The most notorious detail about the death of the Mamas and the Papas singer Mama Cass Elliot on
05:11July 28, 1974, is absolutely incorrect. Namely, she did not die from choking on a ham sandwich.
05:18That was a rumor put out by her manager Alan Carr, who was worried that Elliot had died from
05:23a drug overdose and didn't want anyone to know. Unfortunately, the ham sandwich story has since
05:29been twisted into a number of cruel jokes about Elliot's weight. In fact, Elliot died from heart
05:35failure, potentially brought on by the crashed diets she'd long experimented with, mostly because
05:41she was so badly mocked for her size. Just 32 years old, Elliot died at a London apartment
05:48owned by musician Harry Nielsen, who was out of the country at the time. Her body was flown back
05:53to California, where she was buried at Los Angeles' Mount Sinai Memorial Park, marked with a
05:59simple plaque. Four years later, Keith Moon, drummer of The Who, died of a clomathiazole
06:05overdose at the same apartment. Disturbed by the deaths of his friends, Nielsen sold the apartment
06:11to Moon's bandmate, Pete Townsend.
06:15Singer, songwriter, and guitarist Roy Orbison was only 52 when he died of a heart attack
06:20on December 6th, 1988, but he'd lived through multiple tragedies by that point.
06:25In 1966, his first wife, Claudette Frady, was killed in a motorcycle crash. Two years later,
06:32two of their three sons, Roy Jr. and Anthony, died in a fire at their house near Nashville
06:38while Orbison was on tour. Then, having made the top ten nine times between 1960 and 1965,
06:45Orbison's career steeply declined. However, in between these three great losses,
06:50Orbison met the woman who became his second wife, teenage pre-med student Barbara Jacobs.
06:56The two married in 1969 and went on to have two sons together while also raising Orbison's
07:02surviving son, Wesley, from his first marriage. In the 1980s, Jacobs became Orbison's manager,
07:09and he experienced something of a comeback. In 1987, he was inducted into the Rock and
07:14Roll Hall of Fame, and by then he'd also formed a supergroup, the Traveling Wilburys,
07:19which also included Tom Petty and Bob Dylan. The very next year, however, he died suddenly.
07:24Orbison is buried in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles, but his grave is currently unmarked.
07:30However, you can find its location based on the grave of Barbara,
07:34who was buried beside him when she died in 2011.
07:38After living about as full-on a life as it's possible to live, Frank Zappa died of prostate
07:43cancer on December 4, 1993, aged 52. His family announced his death with a statement, reading,
07:50"'Composer Frank Zappa left for his final tour just before 6 p.m. Saturday.'"
07:55Zappa was buried in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles, a surprisingly conventional choice
08:01for someone who determinedly bucked convention at every opportunity. The cemetery is the final
08:06home of many superstars from movies, music, and the arts. In 2020, a single burial plot there cost
08:13a staggering $745,000. There is one thing that's unusual about Zappa's resting place, however.
08:21He's buried in an unmarked grave, supposedly near Roy Orbison's similarly low-key resting place.
08:27His family is never given an exact reason for this, but it certainly fits with the
08:31character of a man who always preferred to take the path less traveled.
08:36The Beach Boys lost more than a bandmate when 39-year-old Dennis Wilson, the band's drummer,
08:41drowned on December 28, 1983. In addition to being the middle brother of Brian and Carl,
08:47he was Mike Love's cousin, too. Dennis was swimming with three other people
08:51off the Marina del Rey harbor when he dived underwater and never resurfaced.
08:56The week after his death, President Ronald Reagan intervened so that Dennis' body could
09:01be buried at sea, per his wishes, an honor usually reserved for veterans of the Navy or Coast Guard.
09:08In 1997, Dennis' younger brother Carl was diagnosed with cancer,
09:12although he continued to play with the band while receiving treatment.
09:16In December that year, the Wilson brothers' mother, Audrey, died,
09:20aged 80, and was buried in Los Angeles' Westwood Memorial Park. Her grave marker
09:25identifies her as the original surfer girl. Two months later, on February 6,
09:301998, Carl died, too, and was buried in the same cemetery.
09:35Elvis Presley struggled to find privacy when he was alive, and even after his death,
09:40people couldn't keep their hands off him. When Presley died of a heart attack on August 16,
09:461977, aged 42, the nation went into mourning, and in some cases, denial.
09:52The day after Elvis' death, his father, Vernon Presley, allowed around 30,000 fans to view his
09:59son lying in state in Graceland. At the funeral procession the following day, Elvis was taken to
10:06Forest Hill Cemetery in a white hearse, followed by 17 white limousines, for a private ceremony.
10:12Vernon had wanted his son buried at Graceland, but it wasn't zoned for burials. So instead,
10:18Elvis was interred inside a steel-lined coffin weighing nearly 1,000 pounds and placed in a
10:25large mausoleum next to his mother, Gladys. The tomb was then sealed with a double layer
10:30of concrete and covered with a marble slab. That wasn't the end of it, though.
10:34On August 29, three men were caught trying to steal Presley's body with the intention of
10:40ransoming it. After that, the burial rules were waived and Elvis and Gladys were returned to
10:46Graceland. When Vernon died in 1979, he was buried next to them.
10:52One of music's greatest love stories started in the Grand Ole Opry and ended less than 20
10:56miles away in Hendersonville Memory Gardens. In 1956, upcoming country star Johnny Cash met
11:03the already-famous June Carter backstage at the famous Nashville venue. It wasn't
11:08supposed to be love at first sight, however, as both were married to different people.
11:13Nonetheless, that night, Cash reportedly told Carter he was going to marry her.
11:18Their professional and personal relationship deepened in the 60s, when the pair started
11:22touring together. Carter was inspired to write Ring of Fire about her illicit feelings for Cash.
11:28In 1966, Cash's first wife, Vivian Liberto, finally sued him for divorce,
11:34on grounds of infidelity and his addictions to various drugs and alcohol.
11:38Carter and Cash officially became a couple, but it was only when he proposed to her live on stage
11:44in front of 7,000 people on February 22, 1968, that she agreed to marry him. And she did,
11:51just over a week later. The couple was married for 35 years until Carter's death,
11:56aged 73, on May 15, 2003. Cash died a few months later, on September 12.
12:03They are buried next to each other in a joint plot in Hendersonville Memory Gardens, Tennessee.
12:09We share the backstage, the onstage, we share the music,
12:12the feeling and the emotion and the joy of it, you know, and the pain and the sadness of it."
12:18If anything is certain in the world of rock and roll, it's that life can end suddenly.
12:22But David Bowie wasn't worried about that. As his keyboardist Mike Garson once explained to
12:28Billboard, Bowie had decades of advance warning, because in the 1970s, a psychic told him he would
12:34die at 69 or 70. Garson added,
12:38"[Bowie didn't doubt it for a second. He accepted it and planned his future out based on that."
12:43And sure enough, Bowie died on January 10,
12:472016, after what was described in an official statement as an 18-month battle with cancer.
12:53He'd turned 69 two days earlier. Bowie's early warning, as well as his cancer diagnosis,
12:59ensured that the singer could make his final wishes clear. He asked that his ashes be
13:04cremated and scattered in Bali, following Buddhist rituals practiced on the island.
13:09Despite these very clear instructions, and no evidence that his family had any intention of
13:14ignoring them, there were still rumors that Bowie's widow Iman had given permission for
13:18some of his ashes to be scattered at 2016's Burning Man festival. Bowie's son, Duncan Jones,
13:25immediately took to Twitter to shut down the claim, writing,
13:28"'What people will do and say for attention never ceases to amaze me.' Not true."
13:33Kind of a gross claim as well.
13:36Losing Eddie Van Halen in 2020 was a painful twist in a year that had already claimed
13:41so many lives. The guitarist rose to fame with his eponymous band, co-founded with his brother
13:47Alex, and revolutionized the sound that could be made with an electric guitar. He inspired real
13:52and fictional guitarists alike, even providing the music for Marty's Alien tape in Back to the
13:58Future, although he politely declined to part in the Bill & Ted movies.
14:02"'BOOGUS!"
14:04Van Halen was 65 when he died of a stroke on October 6, 2020, after battling cancer.
14:10He had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 2000, but in 2004 said that the cancer was gone.
14:16A few weeks after his death, his son Wolfgang revealed that his father had been diagnosed with
14:21advanced lung cancer in 2017 and given only six weeks to live. Van Halen received treatment in
14:27Germany, which Wolfgang credits with the three years he survived after the diagnosis. But in 2019,
14:33following a motorcycle accident, Eddie was found to have a brain tumor.
14:37It's believed that Wolfgang granted his father's final wishes and scattered his ashes off the coast
14:42of his hometown of Malibu, California. One-third of the most famous girl group to emerge from Motown,
14:49Supreme Mary Wilson, died suddenly on February 8, 2021, aged 76. The cause was later reported
14:57as hypertensive atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, a buildup in the arteries caused by
15:03high blood pressure that eventually leads to heart failure. In keeping with restrictions on
15:08funeral sizes imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Wilson's family held a small private ceremony for
15:14her on March 16, with the intention of holding a larger gathering when it was safe. Wilson was
15:19buried in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California, which is also the final home of a
15:25number of other legendary artists, actors, and musicians. Most importantly to Wilson,
15:30she was buried next to her son, Raphael Ferrer, who had died in a car crash in 1994,
15:37aged just 14. She left behind three other children, including a cousin whom she'd adopted,
15:4210 grandchildren, and one great-granddaughter.
15:46Queen singer and songwriter Freddie Mercury was never afraid to bask in the adoration of
15:51enormous crowds, but he didn't want that kind of attention after his death. Diagnosed with
15:56acquired immunodeficiency syndrome in 1987, Mercury knew that he would likely die within
16:02a matter of years. He decided that he wanted to be cremated and knew just where he wanted
16:07his ashes scattered, but only told his close friend and ex-fiancée, Mary Austin. Not even
16:13his parents knew. Mercury told Austin that the reason for the secretiveness was because,
16:18in his words,
16:19"...I don't want anyone to dig me up. I just want to rest in peace."
16:23After Mercury died at age 45 on November 24, 1991, he was cremated at Kensal Green Cemetery
16:31in northwest London. Austin delayed scattering the ashes for two years, however, worried that
16:37someone would see her and reveal Mercury's resting place to the world. In 2013, a plaque
16:43honoring Farouk Bulsara, Mercury's birth name, was found on a tree in the cemetery in which
16:49Mercury had been cremated. It was inscribed with the phrase,
16:53Pour tous sur, de toi avec tout mon amour, M.
16:57In English, this means,
16:59"...always to be close to you with all my love."
17:02Although many assumed the M stands for Mary,
17:04Austin has since denied that she scattered Mercury's ashes there.
17:10According to his New York Times obituary, Ray Charles once told an interviewer,
17:14"...it's not a question of how long I live, but it's a question of how well I live."
17:18Although there was never going to be a good time to say goodbye to the multi-talented,
17:23genre-defying genius of soul, Charles did live to 73, which is impressive by rock star standards,
17:29especially given that he overcame an addiction to heroin, and he continued to record music and
17:34play live into his last year. Charles died from complications of liver disease on June 10,
17:402004. He was buried in Inglewood Park Cemetery in Los Angeles,
17:44home to a number of other industry icons, from Ella Fitzgerald to Etta James to Sugar Ray
17:50Robinson. Charles' memorial service at L.A.'s First African Methodist Episcopal Church was
17:55also a star-studded affair. Unsurprising, given Charles' legendary status, Stevie Wonder,
18:01Willie Nelson, and B.B. King all performed, and the 1,500 attendees included Reverend Jesse
18:07Jackson and Quincy Jones. Jones told the New York Times that he'd give anything to get Charles back,
18:13but also admitted,
18:14"...I know that heaven has become a much better place with him in it."
18:18"...I knew there was a man that had a voice that touched my heart."
18:24The family, friends, and fans of Irish band The Cranberries were shocked and dismayed when
18:29frontwoman Dolores O'Riordan died on January 15, 2018, aged just 46. O'Riordan was found
18:37dead in the bathtub of her room in London's Hilton on Park Lane, where she'd been staying
18:43during recording sessions. She had called her mother at around 3 a.m. and was found around
18:48six hours later. An inquest found a high level of alcohol in her blood, concluding that her
18:53death was a tragic accident. O'Riordan's body was returned to her native Ireland.
18:58Before her funeral, she lay in repose in an open coffin in St. Joseph's Church in the city of
19:04Limerick, where thousands lined up to pay their respects. The funeral took place on January 23
19:10at the local church in her hometown of Ballybricken, County Limerick, where she used
19:15to sing in the choir. That day, radio stations across the country played The Cranberries' hit
19:20When You're Gone in her honor. After the private service, O'Riordan was buried next to her father,
19:26Terrence, in Cowerley Cemetery, a couple of miles away.
19:31Chuck Berry is so integral to rock music that in 1986, he became one of the first inductees
19:37into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Many consider his 1955 track,
19:41Maybelline, the seed that grew into the genre of rock and roll.
19:45Berry started singing in his church choir aged six and picked up the guitar as a teenager,
19:50performing in a number of small-time talent shows. He was in his 30s when he wrote many
19:55of his most popular songs and released eight Top 40 hits between 1955 and 1960.
20:02As he grew older, Berry continued to play. In 2014, at 88 years old, he was still playing a
20:08monthly gig at local St. Louis restaurant and bar Blueberry Hill. On his 90th birthday,
20:13he announced the release of what would be his last album, Chuck, which he dedicated to his wife of 68
20:20years, Themetta. Before it was released, however, Berry died of natural causes on March 18, 2017.
20:27He was buried in Bellarive Heritage Gardens in his native St. Louis, Missouri.
20:32You can probably guess where Prince chose as his eternal resting place,
20:37but it still comes with a uniquely Prince twist. The iconic singer's sudden death at age 57 on
20:43April 21, 2016, rocked the whole world. It was especially shocking, and no less sad,
20:50to learn that he had died from an accidental fentanyl overdose.
20:54The star had consistently presented himself as anti-drugs and alcohol,
20:58even banning alcohol and cigarettes from his famous Minnesota estate, Paisley Park. Prince
21:04was cremated two days after his death in a private service, as fans laid tributes outside Paisley
21:10Park. At the time, his publicist said that the location of his remains would be private,
21:16but that October, it was announced that Paisley Park would reopen as a museum,
21:20and Prince himself is now the main attraction. As of 2021, Prince's ashes are contained in an urn
21:28designed in collaboration with his sister Tyka Nelson and nephew President Nelson,
21:33that sits in the foyer of Paisley Park. The urn is a miniature version of his house,
21:38complete with a purple piano, working lights, and his gem-studded logo.
21:43If you apologize, then I'll drop the whole thing, too.
21:45I know, I'll do it, but you say it first.
21:47Well, we'll both say it at the count of four.
21:48No, no, we did that already, and it didn't work.
21:50So we'll do it again.
21:52Johnny and Joey Ramone famously hated each other, so it's probably a good thing that
21:56they're buried on opposite sides of the country. The pair never really got on,
22:01but their animosity boiled over when Joey's girlfriend, Linda Danielle,
22:06cheated on him with Johnny. The couple later married. When Joey was dying of lymphoma,
22:11Johnny refused to visit him. The only former bandmate who did was Tommy Ramone.
22:16Joey died on April 15, 2001, and was buried in Hillside Cemetery in Lynhurst, New Jersey.
22:23Johnny did not attend the funeral. The following year, on June 5, Dee Dee Ramone died of a heroin
22:29overdose, aged 50, shortly after the band had been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
22:34He was buried in L.A.'s Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
22:38Johnny followed him there two years later, when he died of prostate cancer,
22:42aged 55, on September 15, 2004. Johnny was cremated, and Linda kept his ashes,
22:48but he also had a four-foot statue of himself placed in the cemetery.
22:52Joey isn't totally alone on the East Coast, though. Tommy Ramone died on July 11, 2014,
22:59of cancer of the bile duct, and was buried in New Montefiore Cemetery, New York.
23:04Janis Joplin
23:05Janis Joplin died of an accidental heroin overdose on October 4, 1970,
23:10three weeks after the death of Jimi Hendrix and nine months before that of Jim Morrison.
23:16Two days later, Joplin was cremated at Los Angeles' Westwood Village Mortuary,
23:21with just 10 people in attendance. Her ashes were scattered in the Pacific Ocean,
23:26off the coast of Marin County, north of San Francisco, as Joplin had requested.
23:31You can't visit the exact spot where Joplin was laid to rest, but it's actually possible to visit
23:37the room where she died at the Landmark Hotel, which is now the Highland Gardens Hotel, on
23:42Franklin and North Sycamore Avenues in Hollywood. If you're feeling morbid, you can even sleep there.
23:48Today, Room 105 is home to a plaque commemorating Joplin,
23:52while the closet is filled with fans' scribbled tributes to the legendary singer.
23:56The lead singer of the enormously popular rock band Nirvana is dead. Apparently,
24:01he was a suicide at the age of 27.
24:04The story of Nirvana frontman and grunge icon Kurt Cobain's death is well known.
24:09Cobain took his own life on April 5, 1994, at his home in Seattle, Washington. His body was found
24:16three days later. After Cobain's death, his widow Courtney Love had his body cremated.
24:22The couple had been intermittent Buddhists, and so Love wanted to give Cobain's remains the
24:28appropriate spiritual treatment. She divided the ashes, scattering some into the Wishkaw River
24:33near Cobain's childhood home and keeping some herself, reportedly in a bear-shaped handbag
24:39alongside her wedding dress. She took these ashes to a Buddhist monastery in Ithaca, New York,
24:45and left some with the monks for consecration. The monks mixed the ashes with clay and turned
24:51them into tzatzis, a kind of cone-shaped sculpture, around three inches tall and painted
24:57gold, which is intended to be kept in a small shrine. Love took the remaining ashes back home.
25:03She kept them in her closet until 2008, when she reported that they had been stolen,
25:07apparently by someone she knew.