10 Musicians That Got Seriously Injured Onstage

For most of us listeners, rock and roll seems like a walk in the park. These people get paid millions of dollars seeing all the sights that the world has to offer, and all for just getting onstage and playing music every once in a while? It can’t be that hard, right? Well…it’s never really that easy is it?

Just like an album can take forever to come to fruition, the process of being on a live stage certainly has some terrifying moments, and some of the biggest stars in the world have actually been through some real pain whenever they got on top of those platforms. It may have just been the result of some faulty accident or it could be the artist not paying attention, but each of them suffered pretty hard for their art, ending up either having to get rushed off to the hospital afterwards or being treated on the stage as the song is still going on.

Since most of these are some pretty heavy injuries, it’s a testament to most of these musicians that they were able to make it through the set most of the time, either playing while they’re still hurt or going for as lost as they can until they eventually drop. Without taking into account people who have actually died onstage, these are the ultimate examples of “THE SHOW MUST GO ON.”

Any great Nirvana show usually had a 50/50 chance of things descending into chaos. Even for some of the lighthearted songs like Come As You Are, you had no idea where things were going to go, from Kurt Cobain throwing himself into the audience to the almost ceremonial ritual that happened towards the end where they trashed their gear and crushed their guitars to bits. None of that was going to change once cameras were in front of them, but Krist Novoselic may have wanted to work on his aim a little better.

Coming in for their first MTV Awards Show appearance, there was already a bit of tension between the band and crew, who refused to let them play the song Rape Me because of its suggestive title. While they did make the compromise by playing Lithium, Kurt did play the first few bars of Rape Me as a prelude before launching into the song. As they tore through the rest of the set though, things started to get a little bit chaotic during the final section of the song, which ended with Krist Novoselic throwing his bass in the air.

Considering this is a soundstage, he couldn't make out his bass in the lights and ended up getting hit right in the face and was barely mobile by the time he went offstage. Then again, this was Nirvana playing live and you were bound to get something like this sooner or later. It was a spectacle for the network, but there's a good chance that this was just another Tuesday for them.