Scorpion Rebels

This article lists examines Scorpio Musicians, or performers born between October 23-November 21. There are many more musical artists with a Scorpio horoscope than those I have highlighted here. I focused on artists who's music I recognized or who's biography/discography showed cultural significance. Let me know if I missed a favorite of yours.

Content warning, this article and embedded videos include examples of lyrics with strong language, sexually charged performances, and drug usage.

There are a lot more lyricist than I expected. I actually decided to begin my research using the "lyricist & songwriter" filter rather than strictly "musicians." This list is constructed by using The Famous People website that allows people to filter by profession, horoscope, gender, and a few other things. I did double back to filter by musician near the end, because some pretty famous performers weren't on the lyricist list(Drake and Katy Perry).

Working this month on my Scorpio playlist I noticed a lot of the performers who were famous in the 60s. So I began with folk and 60s era rock and began working forwards.

In order to fit the greatest sample of songs into this article, I am linking samples of their works to the artist's names. The embedded videos are just examples for the current category or point. So for Folk/60s rock Woodstock seems appropriate.

Folk/60s Rock

• Neil Young (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young)
• Joni Mitchell
• Art Garfunkel (Simon & Garfunkel)
• Gordon Lightfoot
• Grace Slick (Jefferson Airplane)

The music to start with has a certain vibe that puts the listener into a certain vibe to enjoy a festive atmosphere, reflect on personal or worldly events and connect with other free thinkers. So far what I have there seem to be a lot of people who are loosely associated with drug use.

These can be positive, experimental or negative associations. White Rabbit (above) sung by Grace slick for Jefferson Airplane I'd classify as experimental as the lyrics seem to describe a trip, but have neither good nor bad ramifications for Alice (other than she's ten feet tall).

This is not unique to the 60s rock either; I've added a song from each of these genres to my Scorpion playlist that discuss drug use. In the country realm, Miranda Lambert's band Pistol Annies has a song called Takin' Pills that states plainly "one's drinking, one's smoking, one's taking pills" in the chorus. It is not a condemnation, but it just acknowdleges where the band was when the song was recorded. Lorde has a fairly positive song Stoned at the Nail Salon which just happens to include the word "Stoned" in the title and chorus. Her song Sober uses drug terminology as a metaphor for being in love.

"King and Queen of the weekend

Ain't a pill that could touch our rush

(But what will we do when we're sober?)"

Lorde - Sober

Some Scorpio artists have songs from different eras of their discography that have different perspectives on drug usage. Brian Kreizer, a biographer of Neil Young, described the song No More (see below) released in 1989 as a sequel in spirit to the 1972 song The Needle and the Damage Done, although No More does not lyrically mention any drugs.

Even the artists I don't immediately recognize often have some sidenote about dying from a drug overdose or a famous song that has to do with getting drunk/high (Tech N9ne Let's Get Fucked Up). Even if the artists themselves are clean at the time of the song's recording there are often lyrics that may make the listener question it.

"Shiny, happy, see my world in new colors

Higher fire, fly my rocket through the universe [...]

Baby listen please, I'm not on drugs, I'm not on drugs

I'm just in love. You're high enough for me."

Tove Lo - Not on Drugs

Not all successful Scorpions imbibe more to fully enjoy their surroundings, but it does seem to be a majority. That said they may add to the surroundings with a particular spiky appearance. That is very true of many of the performers of the next category.

Rock&Roll

• Scott Weiland (Stone Temple Pilots, Velvet Revolver, Art of Anarchy)
• Glenn Frey (The Eagles)
• Chad Kroeger (Nickelback)
• Matthias Jabs (Scorpions)
• Herman Rarebell (Scorpions)

Oddly only 2/5 of the members of the Scorpions bands actually have the Scorpio horoscope and only one of those was a founding member. I actually checked wiki for the band members names and birthdays individually, because of the name of the band.

A lot of these Sporpio (horoscope not just the one band) performers are known for a very eccentric appearance or performance aesthetic. Scott Weiland (the lead singer of Stone Temple Pilots) apparently used a megaphone on some of his earlier performances to obtain a vocal effect while on stage!?

Even if you haven't listened to a lot of Bjork, the thought of her has a certain sound that immediately comes to mind. The first song I truly listened to was Army of One embedded within the Suckerpunch soundtrack, but even the clip from the movie commands the strange mix of ethereal vocals, rock, electronic effects and... the avantgardness of it since looking for her genre Avantgarde seemed the only one that truly matched it.

Avantgarde/Electropop and ??? genres

• Björk
• Peaches
• Diplo (Major Lazer)
• Tove Lo
• Astrid S
• KD Lang

Several performers on this list have super sensual performances; Canadian singer Peaches is blatantly sexual with songs like Fuck the Pain Away (which has recently been featured by the show Sex Education). Tove Lo has performances that blend the hypersexualized (Talking Bodies) with a fantasy aesthetic in a most bizarre way (Disco Tits). I admit, that last one makes me cringe, but it was memorable.

Some of these performers I listened to and it was very difficult to categorize, because they seem to have created or tweaked their own genre. This is not like the Libra musicians who dabble in other music for fun or the Virgo musicians who collaborate in cross genres with other musicians. The Scorpio musicians like to pick a style and stick with it, but the style they pick is not always a genre that really existed before they came along.

It's almost like they REBEL against the musical world to make what they want to make. Alright Scorpion Rebels might not be my most apt label for this month's music. The more I listen to them the more I find they are people spiky outsides and soft cuddly lyrics just so long as you are within the circle to understand them. Maybe that's why some of them work so well with established genres like sugary pop.

Pop

• Ciara
• Lorde
• Kevin Jonas (Jonas Brothers)
• Carly Rae Jepsen
• Katy Perry

Even among the pop a lot of these artists balance a spiky exterier with softer underlying feelings. I've seen memes about scorpios looking scary, but once you earn there trust being very sweet. I feel like a lot of these pop artists reflect that. In a similar way, the scorpion country artists can hit a more soothing lyrical chord. However, they definitely still got an edge (I would not want to piss off Miranda Lambert).

Country

• Keith Urban
• Miranda Lambert (Pistol Annies)
• Brad Paisely

I wasn't sure if I should put Ciara, Drake or Natina Reed from in Rappers, Hip Hop, or Pop. Honestly I often here them mixed together in similar playlists.

Rappers/Hip Hop

• Drake
• Natina Reed (TLC, Blaque)
• B.O.B
• Sean (Diddy) Combs
• Lil Peep
• Frank Ocean
• Tinie Tempah
• Tech N9ne

I mostly followed the labels I found on these artists, but Hip Hop has a strangely wide berth of music. Drake, TLC, and the BOB songs I picked were fairly safe sounding even if their lyrics touch on not safe topics. The songs for Blaque, Tinie Tempa, and Tech N9ne have an attack to inlaid. In contrast Lil Peep and Frank Ocean are clearly rapping, but it's almost as inwardly reflecting as the folk we started with. It seems to share a lyrical kin closer to older music like blues or jazz.

R&B, Blues, Jazz

• Davido
• Bonnie Raitt
• Diana Krall

Remember earlier when I said that Scorpios like to make something partway between genres and stick with it? The song featured here is Bonnie Raitt between blues and country. Blues and country are sort of musical cousins, but surprisingly few artists have blended those two so seemlessly.

Classical Composers

I'm not adding these to the playlist, but I think it is worth mentioning some of the more eccentric composers of orchestral music seem to be Scorpio's: Niccolo Paganini, Aaron Copeland, and John Philip Sousa. These are composers whose very name conjure up a particular sound in the brain. For Paganini it's romantic and dramatic violin. For Copeland it's the broad frontier sound. Then Sousa of course inspires the sound of a Sousaphone in a large marching band. For any musical scholars out there, I know none of these composers wrote during the Classical era. Still the average person would label these composers musics as classical based on the instruments used alone.

Final Thoughts on Scorpio Musicians

I realize this was a super long article and probably not many of you have read through to the end. For that I thank you. Having investigated I find that Scorpios can be rebellious outwardly. I also find recurring themes of sexuality and drug use across all genres. However, it's also clear that the reason we get to hear about these emotional struggles is because Scorpio musicians share their vulnerability with the listener. This can sometimes be a little scary to listen to, but it also feels like it's a cathartic sharing of their life. So with that, I will leave you with one final song that I feel encapsulates it: Liability by Lorde.