Born Kenneth Keith Downing Jr. on October 27, 1951, in West Bromwich, England, K.K. Downing left home at fifteen and taught himself guitar on a diet of Jimi Hendrix, John Mayall, and Eric Clapton records before joining Judas Priest in 1970. When Glenn Tipton joined four years later, the two forged one of metal's defining twin guitar partnerships, trading solos across British Steel, Screaming for Vengeance, and Painkiller while Downing wielded his signature Hamer Flying V through decades of arena shows. He holds royalty rights to 136 Judas Priest songs, a catalog he partly sold off in 2018. Downing abruptly quit the band in 2011, citing a breakdown in relationships with management, and was never invited back even after Tipton stepped away from touring. He resurfaced with KK's Priest in 2020, reuniting with former Priest singer Tim "Ripper" Owens.

Born Scott Richard Kline on October 27, 1967, in San Jose, California, Scott Weiland fronted Stone Temple Pilots from their 1992 debut Core, a grunge era smash loaded with "Plush" and "Creep," through Purple, which sold over six million copies on the strength of "Interstate Love Song." His raspy, theatrical delivery made him one of the defining voices of 1990s rock, even as his career kept colliding with drug arrests and jail time. STP splintered in the early 2000s, and former Guns N' Roses members Slash, Duff McKagan, and Matt Sorum recruited him to front Velvet Revolver, whose 2004 debut Contraband hit number one and won a Grammy for "Slither." He rejoined and was later fired from STP, then led the Wildabouts until he was found dead on their tour bus in Minnesota in December 2015, at age 48, from an accidental overdose.

On October 27, 2013, Lou Reed died of liver disease at his home in East Hampton, New York, at age 71, months after a liver transplant at the Cleveland Clinic. Reed moved to New York in 1964 to write songs for Pickwick Records, where he met John Cale, and together they formed The Velvet Underground, soon adopted by Andy Warhol as the house band for his Factory scene. Despite weak initial sales, The Velvet Underground & Nico and the raw, feedback drenched White Light/White Heat became blueprints for punk and alternative rock for decades to come. After leaving the band in 1970, Reed launched a solo career that produced the glam rock landmark Transformer, produced by David Bowie and Mick Ronson, whose single "Walk on the Wild Side" became his only Billboard hit. He entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the Velvet Underground in 1996 and as a solo artist in 2015.