Mike Starr was an American musician, best known as the original bassist in the Seattle grunge band, Alice in Chains. A long term heroin addict, he appeared on the TV show Celebrity Rehab with fellow recovering junkie Mackenzie Phillips. It seems that Mike was unable to turn his life around. On 18 February 2011 he was busted for alleged drug possession in Salt Lake City [1]. Putting two and two together I would expect his death on March 8 2011 was drug related.

I’ve just written about the Jupiter Saturn Opposition and how it represents a major turning piont in our lives. This is especially so “If you have any planets or personal points between 12 and 16 degrees in the cardinal sign (Aries, Cancer, Libra, Capricorn) then you may be in for a bumpy ride. This would be most strongly felt with the Ascendant, Midheaven, Moon or Sun in these degrees.”

Mike had his Sun at 14 degrees Aries, so when he died, Saturn was opposite his Sun, Jupiter approaching it, and the January Solar Eclipse was square his Sun. Even without the time of birth, we can still see he would have been feeling the depressing influence of Saturn opposite his Sun.

His Sun is actually on a nice star, Alpheratz in constellation Andromeda, “The chained Woman”. For Mike this was his Alice in Chains. Ebertin found that Alpheratz with the Sun can lead to “becoming well known in public and popularity with the masses”, but also that they “can easily become unpopular and can be toppled over”, especially when hit by transiting Saturn [2].

Drug addiction and especially heroin addiction, is commonly a response to chronic depression, it masks some pain that is the cause of the depression. In Mike’s chart this is so obvious. Mercury retrograde conjunct Saturn gives the depressive thoughts. Chiron conjunct these planets made these negative thoughts about the deepest wound in his soul, and in a vicious circle, these negative thoughts also became his deepest wound which sadly he could not overcome. Even the trine to Neptune shows the easy way out of the depression, the escape route through drugs.

1. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Starr_(musician)
2. Fixed Stars and Their Interpretation, Elsbeth Ebertin, 1928, p.13.