When you reach the peak of musical perfection,
there's always someone out there who wants
to drag you back down, and in some cases bury
you six feet under.
Here are some musicians who were almost killed.
Dana Martin was already serving two life sentences
in 2012 when he sent several letters to Justin
Bieber, and he even got a Bieber tattoo on
his leg while in prison.
Unsurprisingly, Bieber never responded to
the freaky fan mail, which made Martin a tad
angry.
He was also upset that Bieber was turning
into a bad boy, and it didn't help that Martin
wanted his 15 minutes of fame.
Determined to teach Bieber a lesson, Martin
convinced his cellmate, Mark Staake, to castrate
and kill the singer in exchange for $50,000,
a Ferrari, and a farm once owned by Michael
J. Fox.
So when Staake was released from his New Mexico
prison, he teamed up with his nephew Tanner
Ruane and struck out for New York.
But before they reached Bieber, Martin wanted
his hitmen to castrate and kill the two witnesses
who'd helped put him behind bars.
Fortunately, the killers made a wrong turn
along the way and ended up in Canada, where
Staake was arrested for violating his parole.
After officials found a sketch of Bieber and
some hedge clippers in Staake's car, the whole
plot fell apart pretty quickly.
Martin eventually pled guilty to two counts
of attempted murder.
In 2000, while struggling to hit the big times,
50 Cent was sitting in a car outside his grandmother's
house in Queens, New York, when an assassin
walked up to the vehicle and unloaded his
gun.
Nine bullets tore into the rapper's body,
slamming into his leg, hip, arm, right hand,
chest, and the left side of his face.
After emptying his clip, the gunman managed
to escape.
Many suspect the attacker was Darryl Baum,
a man who worked as Mike Tyson's bodyguard,
though he was never arrested.
Before Baum could ever be brought to justice,
he was shot down, possibly in retaliation
for going after Fiddy.
As for the rapper, it took six weeks before
he could walk by himself and five months before
he'd totally recovered.
The attack also permanently altered his speech
patterns, as one gunshot destroyed his mouth.
In fact, a fragment of a bullet is still lodged
in his tongue.
As the rapper explained to Vanity Fair, doctors
didn't remove the bullet as it would've further
damaged his nerves.
But that injury has also given him a voice
like no one else in hip-hop.
In 1996, Jimmy Buffett released a song called
"Jamaica Mistaica," a bouncy little number
about a guy who visits the tropical island
and gets shot at by the police.
Coming from the "Cheeseburger in Paradise"
guy, this seems like a pretty unusual topic.
But as it turns out, it was inspired by a
real-life incident.
Just a few months before releasing the song,
Buffett was flying aboard an old World War
II plane headed for Jamaica, hoping for a
little rest and relaxation.
Also on the plane were Chris Blackwell, the
founder of Island Records, plus U2 lead singer
Bono and Bono's wife and two young kids.
Crazily enough, Jamaica authorities misidentified
their craft as a drug smuggler's plane, so
when it touched down, the cops opened fire.
The trigger-happy gunmen shot around 100 bullets,
forcing Bono and his family to dive for cover.
Fortunately, nobody was hurt in the chaos,
and the Jamaican authorities later apologized.
But Bono didn't stick around long enough to
hear anyone say they were sorry.
When the gunfire stopped, the rocker and his
family flew straight back to Florida, relieved
to have escaped with their lives.
"What was going through your mind when the
Jamaican government shot at your plane?"
"Uh, ducking."
"'Ducking'?"
Headlined by the Rolling Stones, the Altamont
Speedway Free Festival in 1969 featured some
of the biggest bands of the '60s.
Unfortunately, the concert wasn't exactly
peaceful, as the Stones had hired the Hells
Angels Motorcycle Club to provide security.
According to some accounts, the biker gang
was given $500 in free beer to whack concert
goers with pool cues.
By the end of the night, four people were
dead, including 18-year-old Meredith Hunter.
After getting roughed up by the Angels, Hunter
pulled a gun, only to find himself on the
wrong end of a biker's knife.
Captured on film, the stabbing was the death
knell for the free-loving 1960s, and on top
of that, it almost got Mick Jagger killed.
Furious about how things had gone down, Jagger
refused to ever use the Hells Angels for security
again.
This didn't sit well with the biker gang and,
according to ex-FBI agent Mark Young, they
decided to get some satisfaction by killing
the British rock star.
Allegedly, they planned on sailing out to
Jagger's Long Island home, avoiding security
by sneaking up from the ocean and creeping
into his backyard.
Things didn't pan out according to their plans,
though, as a storm capsized their boat, sending
the Angels into the sea.
John Lennon wasn't the only Beatle who was
faced with a truly dangerous fan.
On December 30, 1999, George Harrison was
confronted by a schizophrenic man named Michael
Abram who thought Harrison was a witch who
had possessed Abram.
Thinking God wanted him to kill Harrison,
Abram invaded the musician's Oxfordshire mansion,
armed with a knife and a stone sword he'd
broken off a statue in Harrison's garden.
Fortunately, Harrison stepped out of his bedroom
and saw Abram downstairs.
Hoping to confuse the intruder, the singer
began shouting "Hare Krishna," but the trick
didn't work.
Abram had his mind set on George, and he rushed
up the stairs, ready to kill the pop star.
Harrison was able to tackle Abram, and as
the two battled for the knife, Harrison's
wife Olivia smashed Abram over the head with
a brass poker.
Soon, all three were on the ground in a desperate
fight for life.
During the scrum, Harrison was stabbed in
the chest, and he later described how he could
hear his lung deflate.
As he lay wounded, Olivia Harrison began swinging
a table lamp at Abram, fending him off long
enough for the police to arrive.
After his arrest, Abram spent a few months
in a mental hospital before he was released
in 2002.
One evening in 1971, Elvis Presley found himself
in a tricky situation involving a pistol-packing
assassin named Alice Cooper.
The shock rocker was hanging out with Liza
Minelli, Chubby Checker, and Linda Lovelace
when they were all notified that Prelsey wanted
to meet them.
The group was ushered into The King's Vegas
apartment.
After a few pleasantries, Presley invited
Cooper into his kitchen.
And that's when Presley handed his new buddy
a .38 caliber pistol.
Wanting to show off his martial arts prowess,
Presley ordered Cooper to point the gun straight
at him.
As the rocker trained the snub-nosed pistol
at Presley, a little voice appeared in his
head.
"A little devil here on my shoulder says,
'Shoot him.'"
Fortunately, the good angel on Cooper's other
shoulder won the day.
Moments later, Presley disarmed the rocker
and put Cooper on the ground.
As he removed his foot from Cooper's throat,
he continued chatting like nothing strange
had just happened.
Of course, Cooper was pretty freaked out,
describing the whole evening as "weird."
"There's two things you need to know.
I'm the king, and number two is look out,
man."
In 1976, Jamaica was divided between two political
parties: the liberal People's National Party,
or PNP, headed by Prime Minister Michael Manley,
and the right-wing Jamaican Labor Party, or
JLP, led by Edward Seaga.
Fearing Manley was a communist, the United
States government armed the JLP, which led
to street battles between gangsters allied
with both groups.
The police also got involved, and soon, hundreds
of people were dead.
At about this time, the PNP asked Bob Marley
if he wanted to do a concert in Jamaica.
They promised it wouldn't be a political event,
but would rather be focused on uniting all
of Jamaica.
Marley agreed to perform, but immediately
afterward, Manley moved the national elections
to be held shortly after the concert, making
it appear that Marley was endorsing Manley
by performing so close to election day in
a PNP event.
This turn of events made someone incredibly
angry, and on December 3, 1976, at least three
gunmen stormed Marley's home.
They opened fire with machine guns, hitting
the singer in the arm and wounding his wife
and manager.
While the assassins escaped, everyone survived
the attack.
Two days later, Marley went on stage as scheduled.
He performed for 90 minutes and even showed
off his bandaged wounds.
As one of the most famous pop stars of the
'90s, Victoria "Posh Spice" Beckham has had
plenty of glitz and glamor in her life.
But she's also been the victim of multiple
criminal schemes.
For example, in January 2000, there was a
plot to kidnap her and her eight-month-old
son, Brooklyn.
Fortunately, the Beckhams were saved in the
nick of time, although the crooks managed
to escape as well.
Just two years later, five more people were
arrested for attempting to kidnap Beckham,
although there's a bit of debate surrounding
the story.
As it turns out, the plot was exposed after
the News of the World paid a hefty sum to
a convicted crook, who then ratted out the
alleged kidnappers.
Thanks to this revelation, the five people
in custody were released.
But perhaps the scariest incident occurred
in March 2000.
While rehearsing for a Spice Girls performance,
Beckham was hustled to safety after a red
dot suddenly appeared on her chest.
Shortly afterward, a propped-open door was
discovered, and it was theorized that a sniper
had been preparing to take a shot.
In December 1971, Frank Zappa was performing
at a Swiss casino when someone shot off a
flare gun, burning the place to the ground,
an event that inspired the Deep Purple song
"Smoke on the Water."
Just a few days later, Zappa was playing at
London's Rainbow Theatre when a 24-year-old
man named Trevor Charles Howell charged the
musician and pushed him off the stage.
Howell was upset because his girlfriend had
a crush on Zappa.
The rocker took a 15-foot-dive into a concrete
orchestra pit, a fall that fractured his ankle
and leg, broke a rib, paralyzed an arm, pulverized
his larynx, and put a hole in his head.
Luckily, Zappa survived, but he was stuck
in a wheelchair for nearly a year.
When he finally got out, one of his legs was
shorter than the other, resulting in chronic
back pain.
The smashed-up larynx possibly affected Zappa's
singing voice, making it much deeper.
The whole incident encouraged him to keep
a bodyguard by his side at all times.
In the '90s, a pest control worker named Ricardo
Lopez was obsessed with Icelandic musician
Bjork.
He created art in her honor, and detailed
in his diary about how he wanted to become
her best friend.
He also wrote down his thoughts about killing
himself and others.
No deranged fantasy lasts forever, and in
1996, the 21-year-old Lopez was shocked to
learn that Bjork was in a relationship with
the English musician Goldie.
Lopez was incensed that his beloved singer
was dating.
So he then began working on a plan to punish
her.
The plan was to mail a bomb from his Florida
home to Bjork's London residence.
On September 12, 1996, Lopez put his explosive
package in the mail.
Then, after painting his face with red, green,
and black paint, he shot himself on camera,
as Bjork music played in the background.
Authorities found his body days later, and
the bomb was stopped before it arrived at
Bjork's doorstep.
If you or anyone you know is having suicidal
thoughts, please call or chat online with
the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at
1-800-273-TALK (8255).
