Fkn Jimmy Hendrix
Gotta go with chester, assuming you can bring them back with their health (mental and physical) "fixed" to a good massive balance.
Not because he's any better than any of the other greats that have died. Not even the ones that killed themselves.
Just because there's something about his death that makes his life feel more unfinished.
Out of any of the people listed here, I think he had the most undone. Not even in the musical sense alone, across the board.
Chester without a doubt.
Imo, unfortunately, bringing back Legends will just harm their legacy (I'm thinking of John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie...).
However Tupac may have had an enormous impact in the 90s and early 90s music, and so on.
And who knows how grunge could have gained other mainstream success with Cobain...The first ancient cavedweller to stretch skin over a frame and start hitting it to make noises. Give Grog a full drumset and see what he comes up with
Ian Curtis (Joy Division), though that would probably screw up the timeline for New Order and all of 80's music (not a dealbreaker).
Prince (obvs)
Aaliyah. 22 is far too young to have died, and her career was moving in the craziest direction. She was set to collaborate with Trent Reznor; I wanna see how she would've changed the game.
Stevie Ray Vaughan
Jimi hands down
Bradley Nowell. Sublime was so good, and none of the bands that have followed in their style have had the same lyricism that Nowell had, or have been able to really blend genres like they did to make something completely unique.
Orpheus. I bet he’d do great fronting a metal band.
I would only suggest Ian Curtis if anti-epilepsy medication has advanced significantly since 1980. Dude had it rough.
Liszt.
Hendrix, Rory Gallagher and SRV. Imagine what the blues and the world would be like with those 3 big hitters still around.
Johann Pachelbel. So many modern songs reuse the melody from his Canon in D. I just think, it'd be fun to let him listen to them. Would probably blow his mind to listen to modern music, to begin with, and then to have it be his melody, too. 🙃
Easy: Duke Ellington
Peter Steele
Elliot Smith, no contest. Best singer songwriter ever.
Biggie Smalls
toots and the maytals
Eyedea
Chuck Schuldiner. Greatest death metal vocalist to ever live.
SOPHIE. Hyperpop hasn’t been the same since her passing.
Nightbirde
Stan Rogers. Would pretty much double the number of available sea shanties
Piotr Grudziński of Riverside. It's clear to me their discography went completely different way than it could have after he died being only 41.
Colter Wall, not that he's dead yet but im gonna save it if he dies before me.
Bryn Jones aka Muslimgauze
Justin Townes Earle.
FZ
Can't believe nobody else has mentioned him yet
Bob Marley.
Max Bennett. He's not famous famous but he's well known enough in the jazz scene. He played with Frank Sinatra, Dizzie Gillespie, and recorded on countless studio sessions. I knew him personally and I think was his last student before he passed. Some people closer to him than me told me one of the last things he said was "I need to give jcabral9 his lesson" and it makes me tear up whenever I think about it. I was too young to understand most of his concepts--I wish I could know him as an adult and professional musician myself.
Permanently Deleted
Chuck Schuldiner, frontman of death metal pioneers Death, dude died of cancer in 2001 at the age of 34. I never had the chance to see them play live but their records are incredible.
Cliff Burton, Bass player of Metallica, died when the band's tour bus crashed and he was crushed underneath it. The band lost part of its soul and it took them a very long time to get over Cliffs death. Seeing videos of him playing live makes one understand what was lost, as he was an incredible musician.
On a more general note every artist that died very young, many made a big impact to their genre or even to a wider audience without it ever knowing.
Gabe Serbian
Ricardo Iorio
If your first thought wasn't Lemmy then you need to have a word with yourself mate
Stevie Ray Vaughan.
Sure, there are plenty of musicians who had a bigger impact on music as a whole, but NOBODY I've ever seen was more in tune with the universe than Stevie when he was playing.
As far as I can tell, he didn't actually play the guitar. He just acted as a conduit to channel music directly from the universe through a guitar. I don't think he ever once had to pause and consider what to play next when he was improvising, it just flowed out of him non-stop.
He had already started getting even better, having finally gotten sober, and it kills my soul every time I think about what else he could've given us had he not gotten on that helicopter.
JS Bach.
The only two I would consider otherwise are both alive (Lindsey Stirling and Amy Lee). They even have a collaborative piece 🎉
Hendrix
JW
I'd bring back Sonny. Cher needs her Sonny again.
Tim Maia.
