30 Years Ago: Def Leppard Guitarist Steve Clark Dies
On the morning of Jan. 8, 1991, Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen received a phone call from his manager Cliff Burnstein, bearing news he had been dreading for close to five years. His best friend, co-guitarist Steve Clark, had died while sleeping on a couch. He was 30 years old.
An autopsy revealed the Clark died from an unintentional overdose of alcohol, Valium and Codeine. “He had been drinking and he cracked a rib earlier on,” Collen wrote in his biography
Adrenalized. “The doctor told him not to drink while taking his pain medication. He drank anyway. The coroner’s report, I believe, read that it was due to a swelling of the brain.”