There’s a well-known phenomenon of famous musicians dying at the age of 27. It’s a cliché set in stone at this point, a shortcut to visions of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll leaving the corpses young and pretty.

Most look to such musicians for how they expressed their thoughts and talents within their short lives, but another element plays out in the ignorance of youth. It’s hard to recognise a genuine struggle, and it’s natural to romanticise and elevate some imagined image of artistic divinity. Guiding heroes of a world that hasn’t begun to make sense.

It’s only later in life when their struggle becomes real, when the pain seems tangible. The 27 Club is unmasked as mere human, as imperfect and confused, consumed by hardship and self-doubt, as anyone else.

We continue past the age of 27 while the musicians remain that age forever. They are immortalised as they died, not as beacons of lost potential, but as larger-than-life mysteries.

Yet knowing firsthand how short 27 years on earth truly is puts the mystery to bed. It’s not that they were fated to die young, it’s that they were failed. Failed by a society that put them on a life path without the proper tools to deal with the challenges of their situation. Failed by an industry that only looks to them with money in their eyes. Failed by those around them that could and would only serve to exacerbate their issues. Failed by the lack of consideration and thought for serious and concerning mental health.

Surpassing the 27 Club in age, these deaths are still tragic, but it’s a different feeling of tragedy. They just seem preventable.

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Amy Winehouse, a once-in-a-generation singing and songwriting talent, struggled with a deep-rooted inferiority complex, a mentality commonly handed down through the British working class. The desire to be her authentic self only made a complicated life more complex. Yet it was also her appeal.

In the swirl of praise and success, she lost sight of the authentic self that she set out to realise and turned to alcohol and drugs for some kind of meaning to each second. The music industry continually threw her back onto a stage when she was in no state to do so, and the public realm became a terrifying, debilitating ordeal. Those closest to her failed at each turn to have her best interests in mind. She needed understanding and clarity, something to work from, and that being withheld contributed to an early death where she still had much to offer the world, to those around her, and to herself.

'Surpassing the 27 Club in age, these deaths are still tragic, but there's a different feeling of tragedy. They just seem preventable' (Image: Charles Moriarty)
Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain is one of the more romanticised figures of the 27 Club, owing to a sort of mythological allure that he himself encouraged and cultivated.

Growing up, Cobain saw in every corner a society that didn’t want him. He struggled socially and could only see a future for himself in one of his hometown’s many sawmills. He fell into long bouts of depression, having persistent thoughts of jumping off the family home roof. Even when he was culture’s poster boy, where wearing an oversized short-sleeved V-neck to a Spin magazine photoshoot would throw such things into the domain of the cool and accepted, the words and adulation just weren’t prepared to be internalised.

Without the necessary self-esteem and confidence to handle the challenges in his life, without having a sense of self that remains solid and defiant regardless of how his public image and fame would attempt to warp and shape it, his mental health issues would fall into very dangerous territory.

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Cobain was also a special generational talent consistently failed. The people who purported to care always encouraged the Nirvana machine to continue, never giving space or time to strip back the layers and see a man who was scared and incredibly vulnerable in the situation.

The financial reward from the machine was too great to care beyond the occasional drug intervention that only served to make him feel more isolated and alienated from the people who surrounded him. A ghoulish fact of the music industry is that he is more profitable as a dead addict than as a healthy creative mind who succeeded in fulfilling a life of potential.

Cobain’s suicide in 1994 is still difficult to comprehend fully and continues to leave an emotional and mental void. It was clear to all but himself that he still had a capability for this life, that there was a place he could reach where existence could be meaningful and not so burdened by expectations. He never got to find out what that could feel like.

Seeing the romanticised group of musicians in the 27 Club as the troubled and real humans that they are is sobering. The pedestal giving birth to the otherworldly forces propelling them to create passionate and popular art vanishes, and in its place sits a sombre understanding of reality. Perhaps with more understanding, there would be no need to join such a club.