Argentine Rock Singer Dies After Getting Electrocuted Onstage
There’s a lot of amperage flowing through the gear on while a band is onstage. No one ever things about that until someone gets zapped and dies–and this happens more often that you probably realize.
The most famous story of on-stage electrocution goes back to Les Harvey of the Scottish band Stone the Crows.
http://youtu.be/vttTrXKIiAA
While playing a gig in 1972, Les touched a microphone that was not properly grounded due to some electrical fault. It killed him. This Brazilian performer got zapped but lived. Notice the puff of smoke.
Then there’s metal singer Frankie Palmeri of the band Emmure. He got a near-fatal shock while onstage in Russia.
http://youtu.be/DU8lDvI2RuE
And now there’s been another death. Augstin Briolini, the leader of an Argentine band called The Krebs, was performing at the Theatre of the Sun inVilla Carlos Paz, Argentina. He approached the mic during the first song of the set and was electrocuted. He died at the scene.
This is nuts. I really don’t understand how mics are getting electrified; they aren’t powered of course, they are passive – only sending a low level signal along an xlr cable. Very weird, but obviously it’s possible…
This type of situation (though non-fatal) was portrayed in the movie Almost Famous; I wonder if that was based on a real life incident for one of the bands that Cameron Crowe wrote about… I haven’t read enough of his original articles to know.
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