15 Ridiculous Music Conspiracies That Probably Aren't True, Right?

By Ali Van Houten

Courtney killed Kurt? Old news. And everybody knows that Tupac is supposedly still alive. However, the internet yields even stranger stuff than these common conspiracy theories.

Some of the more obscure finds are hidden deep in the layers of the blogosphere and, if you dare to delve deeper, the black hole that is Reddit. We did some digging to find 15 other music industry conspiracies you might not know about, but should. The truth is out there—we're watching you watch us, Stevie.

1.

2. Beyoncé wasn't actually pregnant.

Despite the hubbub surrounding Queen Bey’s baby bump, conspiracy theorists posit that she was never really pregnant. The proof? In an infamous video interview on Australian television, Beyonce’s belly supposedly folds over when she sits down.

Skeptics also pointed to her robust stage antics, her slender physique, and the fact that the Lenox Hill Hospital shut down when she was in labor, although no one saw Bey enter or leave. There’s also the theory that Beyoncé’s father wanted to give his secret child to the couple to raise. Despite bare-bellied pics of Beyonce and, ahem, the birth of her daughter Blue Ivy, some continue to believe she opted for a surrogate mother to carry her child so she could preserve her figure.

Hot take: “The deflated stomach thing. I watched the video and I don’t know. She sat down and she looked up like 'oh s**t'"—Tamar Braxton

3.

View this video on YouTube

youtube.com

4. Dr. Dre started Burning Man.

In a letter Dr. Dre supposedly penned to the woman who is now his wife, Nicole Threatt—then married to NBA player Sedale Threatt—Dre claims he stumbled upon a bunch of naked hippies partying and hoisting a wooden man in the Nevada desert while he was scouting for a spot to shoot the video for “California Love.”

When the hippies said they weren’t making any money off the party, Dre decided to “make some loot of[f] these fools.” The aptly named tumblr Dr. Dre Started Burning Man claims that Dre is indeed behind Burning Man, at least financially, having been collecting the net profit from ticket sales since 1995, claiming that “to avoid having to deal with scrutiny or show his participation in this event Dr. Dre does all Burning Man-related business under a limited liability corporation called Black Rock City, LLC.”

Hot take: The below letter. This is clearly Dre’s handiwork—just look at the sign-off: “Wish I was up in that ass.”


6.

dr-dre-burning-man-letter

7. Kris Kristofferson is a lizard.

Apparently the famed country singer is a reptile, and he’s not alone. Popularized by British conspiracy theorist David Icke’s 1999 book The Biggest Secret, the reptilian conspiracy posits that a race of tall, shape-shifting, blood-drinking, reptilian humanoids have body-snatched a host of influential people—including not only Kristofferson but also President Obama, the Clintons and Queen Elizabeth II, among others.

These cold-blooded descendants from the Alpha Draconis star system are bent on enslaving the human race and were responsible for the Holocaust and 9/11, among other evil deeds. Reptilians are known for manipulating and deluding humans and causing emotional damage such as self-doubt, angst, turmoil and guilt, causing victims to ultimately lose their sense of self and reality.

Apparently, “ALL HYBRIDS ARE ENERGY VAMPIRES... every single one of them. It’s absolutely possible they were created by tantric or magical or satanic rituals that involved incest.” So hey, your ex might actually just be a reptilian humanoid who’s trying to take over the world.

Hot take: Those piercing blue eyes... and Icke did wear nothing but turquoise for several years straight—I think we’re on to something.

8.

dancing_reptile

9. Andrew W.K. doesn't exist.

Andrew W.K. rose to fame as a goofy, long-haired metal-kid-turned-party-boy with his 2001 album I Get Wet. But in 2004, things started to get strange. After a bizarre situation at a 2004 concert during which he abruptly left halfway through the show and never returned (and some audience and staff members doubted it was even him in the first place), Andrew W.K. abruptly stopped playing music altogether.

He also shaved his ever-present facial hair and lost enough weight to spark rumors that Andrew W.K. is not one man but a stage persona performed by multiple different people, ranging from Dave Grohl to Steev Mike. Some sources say that Steev Mike—an enigmatic figure who is credited as an executive producer on Andrew W.K.’s first album—is actually the puppeteer pulling the strings, but evidence is scarce.

Hot take: "I'm not the guy you've seen from the I Get Wet album... I'm not that same person. I don't just mean that in a philosophical or conceptual way. It's not the same person at all."—Andrew W.K.

10.

View this video on YouTube

youtube.com

11. Avril Lavigne was replaced by a body double.

In the wake of her debut album, Avril Lavigne reportedly hired a body double, Melissa Vandella, to deal with all the paparazzi attention. The two became close friends, and when Avril died (wait what?) Vandella apparently stepped in for her.

The Brazilian fan site avrilestamorta.blogspot.com (yup, that means what you think it means) points to Avril’s sophomore album Under My Skin, which contains such portentous track titles as “Nobody’s Home,” “Take Me Away,” and “My Happy Ending.” Conspiracy theorists also reference variations in her height and skin blemish patterns to prove that the Avril on stage today is actually Vandella.

Hot take:

12.

Avril_hand

13. Nicki Minaj and Jay Z are the same person.

Speaking of Jay Z, rap queen Nicki Minaj is a self-proclaimed fan, even naming her second album The Pinkprint, after The Blueprint. But someone discovered that if you slow down Nicki Minaj’s rapping enough, she actually sounds just like Hov. So really, what other conclusion is there than that the two are one person? Or to put it simply, Nicki Minaj is a time-travelling cross-dressing vampire with mad flow (more on that later). There’s a whole SoundCloud devoted to the “Nicholas_MinjayZ” idea; judge for yourself.

Hot take: “It's quite hard to find a picture of Jay-Z's butt online. He doesn't seem to turn around much when cameras are present.”—Reddit

14.

w.soundcloud.com

15. Jimi Hendrix was murdered.

The official story goes like this: already in poor health, Jimi Hendrix joined the 27 Club as a result of asphyxiation. After a night of partying in London, he returned to then-girlfriend Monika Danneman’s apartment and, unaware of the half-tablet dosage, took nine times the recommended amount of her sleeping pills.

Intoxicated on barbiturates, he vomited (mostly red wine) and subsequently choked in his sleep. Danneman, who later found him unresponsive, gave conflicting reports of events and muddied the waters, but based on his history of mixing alcohol and drugs, few questioned the guitarist’s demise—at the time, at least.

Years later, however, a number of people have come forward claiming that his death was not an accident, ranging from the ridiculous to the (slightly) more credible. A 2009 book written by one of Hendrix’s roadies, James “Tappy” Wright, argues that Hendrix’s manager Michael Jeffery confessed to stuffing a handful of the pills down the musician’s throat to save himself.

"Jimi was worth much more to me dead than alive,” Wright quotes Jeffery as saying. “That son of a bitch was going to leave me. If I lost him, I'd lose everything.” Then there are all the other possibilities floating around: he killed himself, he was waterboarded with red wine, he was killed by the FBI’s Counter-Intelligence Program, etc.

Hot take: “Anyone who would use his death as a warning to stay away from drugs should warn people against the other things that killed Jimi—the stresses of dealing with the music industry, the craziness of being on the road, and especially, the dangers of involving oneself in a radical, or even unpopular, political movement.”—John Holmstrom

16.

ezgif.com-resize (3)

17. Taylor Swift's obsession with the number 13 is evil.

18. Hippies were started by the C.I.A.

19. Stevie Wonder isn't blind.

As a result of complications arising from his premature birth, Stevie Wonder went permanently blind soon after birth, or—according to internet truthers—maybe he didn’t. A series of odd events has led some skeptics, including ESPN’s Bomani Jones, to point out that Stevie Wonder may not, in fact, be blind.

[caption id="attachment_588343" align="aligncenter" width="600"]Image via TMZ Image via TMZ[/caption]


In one of the stronger pieces of evidence, Paul McCartney knocks over a mic stand during a performance at the White House and Wonder manages to catch it before it falls. A photograph of Wonder looking through the viewfinder of a camera, apparently taking a photograph, also cropped up, as did footage of Wonder’s 62nd birthday wish: to film for TMZ (which he said, unsurprisingly, to a TMZ cameraman brandishing a camera). Sporters of the #stevieaintblind hashtag also point to the fact that Wonder, a longtime basketball fan, routinely sits courtside and seems to follow the action. After a 1973 car accident, Wonder permanently lost his sense of smell and even his sense of taste for a while. That said, he’s always had a good pair of ears to, you know, hear the announcers.

Hot take: “When Stevie was little, he would be running around at Motown pulling pranks on people—with no help! Riddle me that! Riddle me that.”—Bomani Jones

21.

View this video on YouTube

youtube.com

22. Morrissey predicted Princess Diana's death.

The Diana-Morrissey Phenomenon presents a series of clues Morrissey laid to predict Princess Diana’s death.

On August 31, 1978, 19-year-old Morrissey supposedly first met his future musical partner in The Smiths, Johnny Marr. Exactly 19 years later, to the day, Diana was killed in a tragic car accident. She crashed into the thirteenth arch of an overpass in France, and oddly enough, the thirteenth word on side one of the album The Queen Is Dead is the word “arches,” while the thirteenth word on side two is the word “smash.”

And there’s more: the cover photo of the album shows French actor Alain Delon, and who pronounced Diana dead but the French doctor Alain Pavie? Still not convinced? The list goes on and on, but one of the more interesting tidbits is the last single Morrissey released just before Diana died, titled “Alma Matters”; Di was killed in the “Alma” underpass.

Furthermore, the cover of the single shows Morrissey leaning against a car—his only cover to feature a car—in the traditional arm-tucked-in-shirt stance of one of France’s most iconic leaders, Napoleon. The back covers even shows three men—reflecting the three men in the car with Diana during the accident—centered around a pillar.

Hot take: Morrissey was interviewed about the tragedy by the Swedish music magazine POP, reportedly saying “It was so predictable. It was expected." Of course, he was talking about the tradition of celebrities dying in crashes like Grace Kelly and James Dean, but still.—DianaMystery.com

23.

ezgif.com-resize (6)

24. Britney Spears was hired by the Bush administration to distract the public.

Pop culture fans may remember Britney Spears’ quote in Fahrenheit 9/11: “I think we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that.” A simple case of Southern solidarity? Perhaps, but Britney's connection to George W. Bush may run deeper.

Conspiracy theorists have pointed out that many of Spears’ most attention-grabbing acts have coincided with controversial moments in the capital, and she may in fact have been hired to divert negative White House PR. Her infamous hair-buzzing incident was concurrent with Bush’s announcement that Al Qaeda was reforming. A year earlier, Britney announced her split with Kevin Federline on the same day that Donald Rumsfeld stepped down.

Does this even make sense? Maybe not. But it’s not stopping some from claiming that Spears is an off-the-books employee of the Bush administration.

Hot take: “Don’t forget that this is the same singer who was rumored to have been caught ‘mid-canoodle’ with Karl Rove during a 2002 Cirque de Soleil show in Rome.”—Idolator

25.

ezgif.com-resize (5)

26. John Lennon was killed by the government.

Understandably, some people have found it hard to accept the senseless tragedy of John Lennon’s death. Then there are those who claim the murder was actually orchestrated by the government to silence a vocal opponent of the Reagan administration, which was just coming into power at the time.

Fenton Bresler’s book Who Killed John Lennon? claims that Mark David Chapman—who was never declared mentally ill and was shockingly calm in the aftermath of the shooting—was a “Manchurian Candidate,” an ordinary man brainwashed into being an assassin for the C.I.A.

Bresler’s theory is that programming an everyday man to commit the murder instead of a professional avoids some complicated questions about the shooter’s skills. However, another theorist named Phil Strongman suggests that the precision of the shots had to be the work of a professional shooter: Chapman was trained by the C.I.A. specifically for his mission.

The internet, of course, has taken this theory and bolted, positing that everyone from the Tavistock Institute to Satan had something to do with the murder.

Hot take: “New World Order head honcho and Satanist, globalist, CIA chief and Tavistock underling vice-president George Bush had Lennon slaughtered on the streets of New York; where he died in the arms of someone that a number of sources claim was the monarch agent deployed by MI6/CIA to keep the exceptionally intelligent Lennon constantly gravitating toward the social fringe; thereby keeping his potential influence at least minimized — Yoko Ono.”—John Quinn

27.

ezgif.com-resize (2)

28. Jay Z is a time-traveling vampire.

A few years ago, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture made an interesting find in the New York Public Library collections: a photo from 1939 showed a Jay Z doppelganger taking a break in Harlem. With that much swag, it had to be Shawn Carter himself, and the internet went nuts trying to figure out how he got back to 1939.

One theory is that Jay Z is a time traveler who went back to the '30s to do research for his work on The Great Gatsby soundtrack (it didn't pay off). Another theory proposes that, like Nic Cage and John Travolta, Jay is a vampire who does not age.

His music includes plenty of allusions to immortality, like “Don't Let Me Die,” “Young Forever,” "In My Lifetime," and "The Best of Both Worlds." I guess we’ll just have to wait another 65 years to see if he actually is young forever.

Hot take: “It’s a hard knock life.” “For… well, everyone.” “Except the Rockefellers. Which is ironic because Jay-Z's record label/clothing brand is called Roc-A-Fella/Rocawear.” “The plot thickens.”—Reddit

[caption id="attachment_588149" align="aligncenter" width="600"]Image via Zimbio Image via Zimbio[/caption]

latest_stories_pigeons-and-planes