A talent gone too soon
AVICII: YOUNG SWEDISH DJ WAS WORLD’S FIRST ELECTRONIC SUPERSTAR
Rock ’n roll had Buddy Holly, the psychedelic era had Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin and grunge had Kurt Cobain. Now electronic dance music had Avicii.
The Swedish DJ’s death on Friday at the age of 28 marks a symbolic coming-of-age for a genre that remains resolutely youthful, with the first electronic superstar to die near his prime.
Avicii, the stage name of Tim Bergling, was not a first-out-the-door pioneer of electronic dance music – or EDM – a scene that has exploded since the turn of the century and last year was worth $7.4 billion, according to a study by the industry's International Music Summit in Ibiza.
But Avicii both showed the mainstream possibilities of EDM – and had already become a sage elder who cautioned about the artistic and commercial overreach of the music.
Avicii came to define the new age of radio-friendly EDM in 2011 with Levels, which entered the top 10 across Europe with its sample of soul great Etta James in between synthesiser riffs that soar with stadium-packing power.
Non-clubbers also heard EDM’s energy when Avicii teamed up with rockers Coldplay on Sky Full of Stars, with Chris Martin’s voice giving way to fast-building, synthesised ecstasy.
But perhaps his most influential moment came in 2013 when he headlined the Ultra Music Festival in Miami. A year after he invited Madonna as a surprise stage guest, Avicii befuddled a crowd of ravers by bringing out a bluegrass band with a banjo for his upcoming hit Wake Me Up.
In an interview shortly afterward, Avicii warned that EDM was moving too quickly into a sound too hard and unmelodious, saying that audiences would soon tire of it. Like other musicians who died with so many years ahead of them, Avicii looks destined to be remembered with an aura of tragedy. He retired from touring in 2016 as he suffered health problems including acute pancreatitis, triggered in part by excessive drinking.
Avicii, who acknowledged his problems in the sole lyric to the song Alcoholic, died while on vacation in Oman.