Janis Joplin: Tragic Loss Of One Of Rock’s Best Female Artists
It’s 52 years since Janis Joplin died of an overdose in Los Angeles aged only 27. Her sad death is the one main fact many people know about her. She remains the best female rock singer there has ever been. October 4th, 1970 is the anniversary of her accidental death at the Landmark Motor Hotel in Hollywood. The Rock world was still getting over Jimi Hendrix who had died only two weeks earlier.
Janis Joplin Was Finishing Up The Album Pearl
She died during the recording of her second solo album, Pearl, which was released after her death and spent nine weeks at #1. It included the hit “Me and Bobby McGee,” which became her only #1 hit. Joplin and her group, The Full Tilt Boogie Band, had fully recorded eight tracks and were preparing for Joplin to lay down the final vocals. The band and Janis even took time to wish John Lennon a Happy Birthday from the studio with a recorded message.
Joplin recorded a message to John Lennon at the request of Yoko Ono, which included a bit of the song “Happy Trails.” One of several people asked by Ono to share a message for John’s 30th birthday, Joplin recorded the endearing “Until We Meet Again” She made the recording on October 1st, 1970. Joplin’s death ruled a heroin overdose, at least, according to the coroner’s official report. Discovered in her Hollywood hotel room on October 4, 1970, the rock and roll legend was clutching her cigarettes in one hand and money in the other. She was 27 years old.
![Janis Joplin - ‘Pearl’](https://wcsx.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2021/08/janis_Columbia-294x300.jpg)
From the opening track of “Move Over” to the closing of “Get It While You Can,” this ‘Pearl’ is a diamond of an album. Released just three months after Janis Joplin’s untimely passing at the age of 27, ‘Pearl’ would top the album charts in five countries, including in the United States. ‘Pearl’ also featured Joplin’s lone number-one hit “Me and Bobby McGee.”
The Rock And Roll 27 Club
THE 27 CLUB is a part of rock and roll history that is tragic and not a club to strive for in the music business. The term came about really around the tragic events of the 1970s when four notable rock stars passed away all close in time to each other. Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Brian Jones and Jim Morrison. Other rock stars tragically joined the club through the years. Not just rock stars but also famous actors lost their lives to addiction, suicide, and auto accidents. Great read on this subject, in this haunting book, author Howard Sounes conducts the definitive forensic investigation into the lives and deaths of the six most iconic members of “the 27 Club.”
Rock And Roll Stars Part Of The Deadly 27 Club