Emily Ota | Writer
October 24, 2024
The 27 Club, an informal list of musical artists who have died at the young age of 27, is infamous. But is the Club a series of tragic coincidences, or did the celebrities simply reach their inevitable fate? From Jimi Hendrix to Kurt Cobain to Amy Winehouse, the 27 Club reaches far and wide and leaves people wondering who is next. To most people, the 27 Club is just a devastating twist of chance, but some enthusiasts think it is something much deeper.
Some die-hard fans believe the untimely deaths are just too similar to be a coincidence. All members of the club passed away at 27 due to tragedies. The most common causes of death in the 27 Club are overdose, suicide, car accidents, and murder. Super-fans of 27 Club artists “often mythologize these musicians into Rock Gods and Goddesses, and sometimes regard their early deaths as somehow inevitable;” which explains the crazed conspiracy theories behind the 27 Club, such as the “Crossroads Myth” and the “Creative Peak” (DC Public Library).
The Crossroads theory backs up the 27 Club by explaining that talented musicians bargained their lives at 27 for their exceptional gift. It states that along their road to stardom, the musicians entered a figurative crossroad where the Devil offered them fame in exchange for their death at 27 years old.
The other most common conspiracy, the Creative Peak, suggests that the age of 27 is a time of intense creativity and production for artists, but that creativity has to come with some kind of substance abuse, turmoil, or self-destruction. The Creative Peak means to say that for extremely talented musicians, death is unavoidable and will most likely occur at the peak age of 27.
Sydney Hernandez, a sophomore at SCHS, takes a different perspective, stating that she thinks “someone or a group of people is behind the deaths because they didn’t want the fame of the now deceased to overpass them.” This is an interesting view because it leads people to think the deaths are designed by somebody who is famous themselves, leaving them to wonder if it is someone they know of. All three theories represent the unnerving relation between the members of the 27 Club and give reason to why and how the deaths occurred.
On the bright side, a few optimists believe the 27 Club is done growing and the list will stop at its current 54 members. SCHS sophomore and Jimi Hendrix fanatic, Scarlett Farrow, explains that it won’t continue to expand because “there haven’t been any more famous artists added to this club” since Anton Yelchin in 2016. The 27 Club is one of the world’s most interesting and mysterious clubs, but hopefully there will be no new members added in the future.
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