Music fans can be absolutely crazy, we know this. But nothing is as insane as some of the conspiracy theories that have been proposed by said crazies, which span everything from fake deaths to murder to albums that sync up with famous films.
What’s most interesting is that the advent of the internet has done little curb the crazy theories. If anything, it’s made them spread faster and wider and there’s even theories about many of today’s biggest artists.
In the interest of archiving some of these ridiculous, creepy, hair-brained, but sometimes downright plausible conspiracy theories, we’ve gone ahead and selected 12 of the most memorable and most unnerving we could find.
Music fans can be absolutely crazy, we know this. But nothing is as insane as some of the conspiracy theories that have been proposed by said crazies, which span everything from fake deaths to murder to albums that sync up with famous films.
What’s most interesting is that the advent of the internet has done little curb the crazy theories. If anything, it’s made them spread faster and wider and there’s even theories about many of today’s biggest artists.
In the interest of archiving some of these ridiculous, creepy, hair-brained, but sometimes downright plausible conspiracy theories, we’ve gone ahead and selected 12 of the most memorable and most unnerving we could find.
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Paul McCartney Is Dead
A rumour of Paul McCartney’s death started after a car crash in 1967, however it wasn’t until 1969 when a group of Iowa students noted that if you listened to ‘Revolution 9’ backwards you heard the message “turn me on, dead man”. Similarly, the front cover of Abbey Road is often cited as a funeral procession, with a barefooted Paul as the dead man.
Barenaked Ladies’ “One Week” Is About Murder
While most remember it as a fun, tongue-in-cheek, pop rock tune, one Reddit user believes the lyrics hide something more sinister. Specifically, the lyrics apparently veil the story of a man who murders his girlfriend.
Beyonce and Jay-Z are establishing a new world order
Professor Griff of hip-hop crew Public Enemy alleged that Jay-Z, Beyonce, Diddy and more are members of the Illuminati, a secret Masonic organization that controls world affairs and events to establish a New World Order.
Brian Jones was murdered
Brian Jones was found lying face down at the bottom of his pool. His death was determined by coroner as “death by misadventure”, however there are suggestions that a construction worker may have murdered him in the pool.
Britpop was a government conspiracy
At least that’s according to My Bloody Valentine frontman Kevin Shields, who claims the ‘Cool Britannia’ movement that boomed in the mid-90s “was massively pushed by the government.” Claiming the great Blur/Oasis rivalry may have been cooked up by then-PM Tony Blair, while the likes of Pulp, Suede, Elastica, and The Charlatans were used to push patriotism upon the youth. “Someday it would be interesting to read all the MI5 files on Britpop,” he claimed in a 2013 interview; “The wool was pulled right over everyone’s eyes there.”
Dark Side of the Rainbow
In 1995, no doubt in a hazy college dorm room, it was discovered that there’s a great synchronicity between Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon and The 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. That is, if you play the album as an alternate soundtrack to the film, they’re perfectly synchronised. Coincidence or conspiracy?
Elvis is alive
Plenty of people have voiced the idea that Presley’s death could have been a hoax to afford the singer a lifetime of freedom from the public eye. But it wasn’t until a book by Gail Brewer Giorgio entitled Is Elvis Alive was published in 1988 that the theory gained traction, even spawning the elvis-is-alive.com website. One theory is that President Nixon appointed him an undercover DEA agent to fight drug use. Thank you very much
Gangsta Rap was used to help fill America’s prisons
A very juicy (and wholly unconfirmed) theory from an anonymous record exec, from a confessional report that surfaced in 2012, implicates a music-wide conspiracy by 90s record label executives using aggressive rap and hip hop to incite America’s youth to get them locked up. Why? Because the record labels’ own investments in privatised US prisons meant they profited the more people there were behind bars, lining the penal system with impressionably young gangstas in order to get rich.
Kurt Cobain was murdered
A private detective hired by Courtney Love claimed that someone else wrote sections of Cobain’s suicide note and that he had so much heroin in his system, he wouldn’t have been able to pull the trigger.
Robert Johnson sold his soul to the Devil
It’s alleged that as a young man growing up in Mississippi, Johnson was instructed to goto a local plantation after midnight. There, Johnson, who had always wanted to be a successful Blues musician was greeted by the Devil. The Devil played a few songs on Johnson’ guitar then promptly returned it. When Johnson played the guitar immediately after, he had a mastery of the instrument.
Stairway To Heaven played backwards is Satanic
Backmasking was first used by the Beatles, and has been used by plenty of artists for different reasons. However, in the eighties, Christian groups in America started crying foul at supposed satanic messages in reverse in rock and roll songs. Led Zeppelin were accused of having a backmasking messaging pertaining to “my sweet Satan”, whilst the message “it’s fun to smoke marijuana” can be found in Queen’s ‘Another One Bites The Dust.’ In reverse.
The FBI plotted to end The Rolling Stones’ career
Have you heard the one about Britain’s MI5 collaborating with the FBI to sabotage the Rolling Stones image? Allegedly, the infamous 1967 Redlands drug raid on the Stones’ mansion was concocted by the two agencies to ruin the band’s chances of touring America – using the band’s drug dealer, ‘Acid King Dave’, as a mole to infiltrate the Stones’ inner sanctum. But according to a ‘confession’ from the Acid King, the whole operation backfired and instead made the Stones bigger than ever. Blimey!
