# "Clean Living" Rock Stars? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 29, 2017, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303 "2017-03-29T19:20:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ken001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/43a26b/32.png) [@Ken001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ken001)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/21 "2017-03-30T12:50:15Z")
Cliff Richard. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/22 "2017-03-30T12:50:43Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > It depends on what counts as drug use but Neil Young has had a pretty clean nose. I take it you never noticed the white stuff on his nose during his appearance in _The Last Waltz_. He’s openly complained in recent years that having to stop smoking marijuana after his stroke has hurt his creativity. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/23 "2017-03-30T13:02:32Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > I had to add artists who people assume are drug users but who are reportable not. But I think fame and touring don’t really work well with family life so I am ignoring that. > > J Mascis > Frank Zappa > Henry Rollins > Morrissey > > And if you remember Adam Ant’s - Goody two Shoes; that song was written about people giving him flack for not drinking or using drugs. I wouldn’t have known enough about Mascis to hazard a guess, and definitely would have thought Zappa was on _something_ had I not known otherwise, but Rollins and Morrissey seem like they have an above-average chance of “clean living” relative to other rock stars. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/24 "2017-03-30T17:54:44Z")
> [@Smid](#): > > Bruce Dickinson. Not the one with _a fever._ ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/25 "2017-03-30T18:20:51Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > It’s probably already mentioned in one of the linked threads, but isn’t Charlie Watts the poster child for this? He’s been married and a faithful family man since the early Sixites, but he had his issues with booze and drugs, so he’s not perfect. I think a lot of older rockers are NOW clean, though they weren’t always. Neil Peart is a fitness buff who brings his bike on tour and rides 30-50 miles in every town Rush tours in… but all the guys in Rush admit they drank and got high a lot when they were young. They mostly cleaned up when they started having kids, and realized they just COULDN’T keep up the old lifestyle and be decent Dads. Several years ago, I saw a documentary about the British band Status Quo. All the guys in the band were laughing about how they USED to drink, party and get high… but now that they were in their 60s and 70s, they were all exercising, drinking nothing stronger than tea, and eating healthy, because their bodies CAN’T go through the abuse they used to take. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/26 "2017-03-30T19:41:05Z")
I read a while back that VH-1 wanted to do a “Behind The Music” on Kansas, but the project was scrapped when the band members turned out to not really have any hard-luck stories. Kerry Livgren has, however, revealed that several of the band members, himself included, did a lot of drugs in their time. Their violinist lost an eye somewhere along the line, and Livgren himself had a stroke a few years ago that left him permanently disabled. The Go-Go’s had a squeaky clean image when they were famous, and it turned out to be a huge PR stunt. Belinda Carlisle STILL battles drugs and has admitted it. I’m surprised ANY of them are still alive. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/27 "2017-03-30T19:46:16Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > Pat Boone doesn’t have any sons, but his daughter Debby became famous for about 15 minutes with her song “You Light My Life.” She still performs, as a gospel singer. She doesn’t WANT to be really famous, but is grateful that she can perform at the level that she does. One of her sisters, who has also had a relatively successful gospel recording career, has had issues with eating disorders. Lots of R.E.M. fans have had a hard time believing that any of them did drugs, but I know otherwise. There are persistent rumors that the band split up because of Peter Buck’s alcohol use, and between the 4 of them, there probably isn’t a drug they haven’t tried - not even heroin. Michael Stipe has admitted that he tried it but didn’t like it (thank God!), and has also dealt with eating disorders. I also made a lot of co-workers squirm when I was in college in the early 1990s, and one of them asked me if any of them had kids and I replied, “They probably all have kids that they don’t know about.” As for their arrest records, there was that infamous incident with Peter Buck on a transatlantic flight involving Ambien and wine (a local DJ said, “This is not Ozzy”) and Buck was arrested when he was in college for renting a car and not returning it on time. Mike Mills was also arrested as a young man for trespassing and public indecency for climbing a water tower with a girlfriend, and both were wearing nothing but their shoes. :eek: 😛 ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/28 "2017-03-30T19:51:53Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > I think a lot of older rockers are NOW clean, though they weren’t always. Neil Peart is a fitness buff who brings his bike on tour and rides 30-50 miles in every town Rush tours in… but all the guys in Rush admit they drank and got high a lot when they were young. They mostly cleaned up when they started having kids, and realized they just COULDN’T keep up the old lifestyle and be decent Dads. Alex Lifeson was arrested, along with his son and DIL, in the early 00s for public intoxication and assaulting a police officer, and he apparently still rides the Thailand Express, although he says it’s for medicinal use because he has psoriatic arthritis, which is not a fun disease. I’ve seen the band 4 times, and they never played “A Passage to Bangkok” at any of them. 😕 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnXRwmcKnes](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnXRwmcKnes) ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/29 "2017-03-30T19:55:38Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > Frank Zappa > [@Ludovic](#): > > I wouldn’t have known enough about Mascis to hazard a guess, and definitely would have thought Zappa was on _something_ had I not known otherwise, […] Zappa had only three drugs: music, caffeine and nicotine. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/30 "2017-03-30T20:01:34Z")
I can’t imagine that any of the guys in U2 have done much in the way of substances, although Bono has admitted that he has been unfaithful to his wife. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/31 "2017-03-30T20:55:05Z")
Jimmy Buffett, as far as I know, at least for the later stages of his career. Booze, yes, but not immoderately, and he has built a billion-dollar business empire, which speaks of a clear mind. ---
**Author:** ![Quintas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/48db29/32.png) [@Quintas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quintas)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/32 "2017-03-30T21:53:18Z")
> [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > Isn’t Sting the poster child for this sort of thing? Maybe nowadays. But here’s an interview from 1984 (5:00 mark) where I am pretty certain he’s been snorting coke. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvOayRsVR4s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvOayRsVR4s) ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/33 "2017-03-30T22:01:25Z")
At the height of their fame in the late 1990s, I saw a 1-hour block on the cable guide titled “Hootie & The Blowfish.” It was on the Golf Channel. They hit the links with Arnold Palmer, and some other golfers who are household names. Whatever one might think of their music, or what else they might do, I said then and would say now that it’s highly unlikely that we’ll pick up a newspaper and read that any of these guys have been found dead with a needle in his arm. 😛 However, Darius Rucker did get a little talking-to from his management when the band reached Enormodome status, because his between-song banter included a lot of profanity, and there were significant numbers of children and senior citizens in their audiences. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/34 "2017-03-30T22:06:31Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > She still performs, as a gospel singer. She doesn’t WANT to be really famous, but is grateful that she can perform at the level that she does. Boone’s youngest child is an actress, and has had roles on “Gray’s Anatomy” and several other TV series. > **[Tessa Ferrer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tessa_Ferrer)** > > Tessa Rose Ferrer (born March 30, 1986) is an American actress. She is known for playing Dr. Leah Murphy, a surgical intern then resident, in Grey's Anatomy. > She is the daughter of singer Debby Boone and Gabriel Ferrer. > In 2012, Shonda Rhimes cast Ferrer in a recurring role as Dr. Leah Murphy in season nine of the ABC drama series Grey's Anatomy. In June 2013, she was promoted to series regular for season ten; however, in March 2014 (2014-03), it was announced that she would be exiting the show... ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/35 "2017-03-30T22:26:52Z")
Nugent supposedly is and has been a teetotaler. though his vice was an apparent inability to keep it in his pants. > [@Alessan](#): > > In Bruce Springsteen’s case, it seems that the answer is that he really, really, \*really \*loves performing, and he avoids anything that could get in the way of making music in front of a crowd. or, some people don’t believe being musically talented is a license to treat everyone else like dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2017, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/36 "2017-03-31T00:18:10Z")
Did Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull do drugs? I remember a “Trouser Press” interview with him in the early 1980s and he commented on how he was always being offered stuff because people assumed with his stage act and hair that he was using but he turned them down. Maybe he had “minor vices”. He also had an amusing story when Tull went on tour in the mid 1970s they decided to hire a string quartet. To distinguish them from the regular band, they hired four women and for further grins and giggles, hired four ugly women. As it turned out, one of them was always menstruating at some time, which caused unpleasantness. Anderson said he never slept with any of them but other band members did, one having sex with all four. When it came time for the next do, it was "hire a man who plays synthesizer’. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2017, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/37 "2017-03-31T01:39:05Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > Zappa had only three drugs: music, caffeine and nicotine. and sex. And on at least a few occasions, marijuana. ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2017, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/38 "2017-03-31T01:45:24Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > Nugent supposedly is and has been a teetotaler. “The stakes are high, and so am I. It’s in the air to-ni-yi-yight.” (_Free For All_) I’m not entirely sold on the veracity of those lyrics - who knows. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2017, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/39 "2017-03-31T02:09:07Z")
I think Carl Palmer has always been a fitness buff and he went vegan several years ago after bad case of e. coli. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2017, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303/40 "2017-03-31T08:07:03Z")
> [@Jim\_s\_Son](#): > > Did Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull do drugs? Nicotine 9ex-) and alcohol (but not a boozer - more the glass of sherry by the fire [type of thing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wnM3YPEY58)) but nothing else, according to multiple interviews over the years. While he has been married twice, the second marriage has lasted from 1976 till today. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/clean-living-rock-stars/783303.md?page=3)