Jaco Pastorious
In the early to mid-1980s, Pastorius began to experience mental health problems, including symptoms of bipolar disorder. These were worsened by heavy recreational drug and alcohol use. Although his on-stage and off-stage antics were already well-documented, his mental health and addiction problems served to exacerbate his unusual and often bizarre behaviour. There are dozens of anecdotes and stories about his outlandish behavior and eccentricities, though some were highly exaggerated. His musical performances also suffered. During this time he played in various solo acts and many nightclubs in Fort Lauderdale and New York City. He fell out of public favor and became an outcast in the music business. His final address while alive was Holiday Park in Fort Lauderdale. After sneaking onstage at a Carlos Santana concert September 11, 1987, he made his way to the Midnight Bottle Club in Wilton Manors, Florida. He was trying to show off his playing. There he was brutally beaten into a coma after an altercation with the bouncer of the club, Luc Havan, who was trained in martial arts. Coincidentally, this location is barely one mile from his childhood home. He suffered irreversible brain damage. After life support was removed, his heart continued to beat for three hours.
Jaco Pastorius died on September 21, 1987, just ten weeks short of his 36th birthday (incidentally, within weeks of the age at which Mozart died), at Broward General Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale. He is buried at Our Lady Queen of Heaven Cemetery in North Lauderdale. Havan was charged with aggravated battery, and served four months in prison.
The recorded legacy he left behind, particularly the work with Weather Report, Joni Mitchell and his own Word of Mouth band, remains for the ages.
Miles Davis honored the late bassist on his album Amandla with the Marcus Miller composition "Mr. Pastorius," as Jaco was an inspiration to Marcus Miller.
Jeff Buckley
After completing touring in 1996, Buckley started to write for a new album to be called My Sweetheart the Drunk. In 1997 he moved to Memphis, Tennessee, bought a house there and started recording demos on his own 4-track recorder. He went into the studio again, recruited a band, and plans for the new album looked hopeful.
On May 29, 1997, the evening that his band came to join him in his Memphis studio, Buckley went swimming in the Wolf River, a tributary of the Mississippi River. His friend Keith Foti remained ashore and, after moving a radio and guitar out of reach of the wake from a passing tugboat, looked up to see that Jeff was gone. Despite a rescue effort mounted that night, Buckley's body was only spotted a week later by a tourist on a riverboat and brought ashore.
It was widely speculated that Buckley may have committed suicide, partly because he went swimming in the river wearing his heavy boots. The biography Dream Brother, written about him and his father, reveals that the night before his death Buckley reportedly admitted to several loved ones that he suffered from Bipolar disorder. It has been confirmed by autopsy that Buckley had taken no illegal drugs before his swim, and that a drug overdose can be ruled out as the cause of his death.
A recent statement from the Buckley estate insists, "Jeff Buckley's death was not "mysterious", related to drugs, alcohol, or suicide. We have a police report, a medical examiner's report, and an eye witness to prove that it was an accidental drowning, and that Mr. Buckley was in a good frame of mind prior to the accident."
After Buckley's death, a collection of demo recordings and a full length album he had been reworking for his second album were released as Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk. Three other albums composed of live recordings have also been released, along with a live DVD of a performance in Chicago.
Janis Joplin
During the fall 1970 recording sessions for the Pearl album with The Doors and Phil Ochs producer Paul A. Rothchild, Joplin died, aged 27, of an overdose of unusually pure heroin and alcohol, after being off drugs for a period of time. This occurred on October 4, 1970 at the Landmark Motor Hotel located at 7047 Franklin Ave, room #105 in Hollywood, California. The last recordings she completed were "Mercedes-Benz" and a birthday greeting for John Lennon on October 1, 1970; Lennon later told Dick Cavett that her taped greeting arrived at his New York home after her death.
She was cremated in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Westwood, California, and her ashes were scattered into the Pacific Ocean. The album Pearl, released six weeks after her death, included a version of Nick Gravenites' song "Buried Alive In The Blues", which was left as an instrumental because Joplin had died before she was able to record her vocal over the backing track.
Not recognized by her hometown during her life, she was remembered much later. In 1988, her life and achievements were showcased and recognized in Port Arthur by the dedication of the Janis Joplin Memorial, with an original bronze, multi-image sculpture of Joplin by Douglas Clark.
Jerry Garcia (we miss you dood)
Jerry Garcia died on August 9, 1995 of a heart attack exacerbated by sleep apnea. Garcia, who struggled with drug addiction and sleep apnea for much of his adult life, was staying at the Serenity Knolls drug rehabilitation center in Forest Knolls, California at the time. On his passing, he was honored by President Clinton as being "an American icon." Memorial services were held in Golden Gate Park on August 13, 1995. Along with the band members, his family and friends, thousands of fans were present, many singing and playing in drum circles.