10 Musicians Who Committed Real Crimes, Did Real Time - And Had Real Impact

One of the less well-known musicians on this list, but with his elegant keyboard playing featured on records by The Rolling Stones, Little Richard and Elton John (among many others), Billy Preston’s pedigree is not open for question. Most famously he stepped in towards the end of The Beatles' career and is often credited with keeping the increasingly fractious group together while they recorded some of their last, and best, works. Preston played with them at their final live performance in 1969, contributed the wonderful electric piano part to Get Back (and was a featured artist on the song) and played on several tracks on the Abbey Road LP. He also had a number of successful solo albums and topped the US chart in 1972 with Will It Go Round In Circles.

He never quite broke through to the mainstream in his own right, however, and spiralled into drug problems, with numerous other troubles in the '80s and '90s. In 1992 he was ordered to spend nine months at a rehab centre after being charged with cocaine possession, and was subsequently given three years in prison for violating his probation.

His craziest episode occurred as recently as 2001, when he was charged with insurance fraud after it was alleged that he and a group including his former manager had been staging car crashes, robberies and starting fires in order to make false claims. As well as fines, Preston was given a further five years’ probation and a year in jail. In his final years he did manage to salvage his reputation somewhat with stints playing for Eric Clapton and appearances on work by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Neil Diamond. He passed away in 2006.