9 Musicians Who Died While Performing

Johnny Watson (or "Johnny Guitar" if you dig) was as important to blues and funk music as Jimi Hendrix was to rock n roll. In fact, Johnny Guitar was regularly compared to Hendrix for the types of guitar stunt work he used to pull off, even managing to pluck away while performing a handstand. To put it mildly, Johnny Guitar was a virtuoso with a knack for flair.

He was a showman who died a showman's death. During the final stretch of his 1996 tour of Japan, Watson came out on stage to play the first song of the night, "Superman Lover," but midway through it shoved the mic stand into the audience and fell directly onto his back. Most of the audience thought it was part of the show, until they realized that he wasn't pulling the old "playing guitar from the ground" move. Instead, he'd suffered a heart attack.

Because apparently that's...the only way musicians die? Wow, that's already a lot of heart attacks.