The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars (153 page)

Lest We Forget

Other notable deaths that occurred sometime during 1992:

Roy Claxton Acuff
(celebrated US honky-tonk musician dubbed The King of Country Music - mainly for his nurturing of others; born Tennessee, 15/9/1903; congestive heart failure, 23/11)

Peter Allen
(Australian singer/songwriter who scored indigenous #1s with ‘I Go to Rio’ and ‘The More I See You’ in 1977, although fared best of all with songs written for others including Olivia Newton-John; born Peter Woolnough, New South Wales, 10/2/1944; AIDS-related illness, 18/6)

Jackie Edwards
(‘Jamaica’s Nat “King” Cole’ - a singer/songwriter whose credits include two Spencer Davis Group chart-toppers; born Wilfred Gerald Edwards, 1938; heart attack, 15/8)

Steve Gilpin
(popular New Zealand newwave singer with Mi-Sex; born Wellington, 28/4/1950; car crash returning from a gig, 25/11)

Herb Kenny
(US bass with the pioneering Ink Spots; born Pennsylvania, 12/6/1914; natural causes, 11/7 - two months ahead of lead tenor Jimmie Nabbie)

Randy Laire
(US bassist with Bay Area thrash-metallers Heathen; car accident, which also killed his girlfriend, who’d fallen asleep at the wheel, 9/1)

William ‘Hank’ Mizell
(US rockabilly singer/guitarist best known for the 1976 smash ‘Jungle Rock’; born Florida, 9/11/1923; unknown, 23/12)

Charlie Ondras
(US drummer with Jon Spencer-led altrockers Boss Hog and his brother Chris’s industrial-noise act Unsane; born New York, 1965; heroin overdose, 6/1992)

Brenda Payton
(US R & B leader of Brenda & The Tabulations; born Pennsylvania, 1949; illness, 14/6)

Fleming Williams
(US tenor vocalist with soul/disco act The Hues Corporation - he left just after their 2-million-selling 1974 #1 ‘Rock the Boat’; born Michigan, 1953; drug-related, 9/1992)

Ozaki Yutaka
(Japanese rockabilly singer/’pin-up’; born Tokyo, 29/11/1965; pulmonary oedema - found naked in an alleyway, he is believed to have been force-fed alcohol/amphetamines, 25/4)

1993

JANUARY

Friday 22

Helno

(Noël Rota - 25 December 1963)

Les Négresses Vertes

One of the more arresting French musical exports of the postpunk era, Les Négresses Vertes (‘The Green Negresses’ – an insult apparently thrown their way by French bouncers) fused cabaret, street performance, ska and flamenco to create a unique sonic and visual experience. Head of this vast troupe – sometimes fifteen-strong in the studio – was vocalist Helno Rota de Louracqua, generally referred to by his (assumed) first name. Formed in 1987, the band debuted with the striking, anarchistic
‘200 Ans d’Hypocrisie
’, and proved an unlikely hit at British festivals. A debut album,
Mlah!
(1988), similarly gained much critical praise this side of the channel and has since shifted half a million copies worldwide.

Helno’s life and career were curtailed, however, by his vast appetite for alcohol and particularly hard drugs. Although a second album, 1991’s
Famille Nombreuse,
found its way on to BBC Radio One’s playlist, Helno was now undergoing rehabilitation, his heroin habit seriously out of control and detrimental to his writing and performance. Just as it appeared Helno had beaten his addiction, the singer was found dead, apparently from an overdose, at his home. Les Négresses Vertes rallied to issue further records in their figurehead’s absence, but much of the original charm of their work was sacrificed to the input of producers and remixers.

FEBRUARY

Thursday 18

Patrick Waite

(Jamaica, 16 June 1969)

Musical Youth

Bass-playing Patrick Waite – like his cohorts in happy-go-lucky reggae scamps Musical Youth – was brought up in Birmingham, England; he was the son of Techniques vocalist Frederick Waite and alongside his brother Freddie Jr (drums), Waite joined Duddeston Manor school-friends the Grant brothers – Kelvin (guitar) and Michael (keyboards) – plus vocalist Dennis Seaton to form the band in 1979. A locally released single ‘Political’/’Generals’ emerged the following year, and, after being championed by DJ John Peel, Musical Youth found themselves in the unlikely position of being signed to MCA while still at school. In 1982, the group’s bouncy cover of The Mighty Diamonds’ ‘Pass the Koochie’ (altered to ‘Pass the Dutchie’ to avoid any career-stymieing drug references) stunned the pop world by shooting to number one in Britain within two weeks of release, then propelling Musical Youth into the US Top Ten. A strong album and three further Top Twenty hits in their homeland (including a pleasing-enough 1983 collaboration with Donna Summer on ‘Unconditional Love’) kept The Youth in the public eye for another year or so, before their fortunes – and especially those of Patrick Waite – took something of a downturn. Following a poor-selling second album and Seaton’s departure, Musical Youth split in 1985.

For Patrick Waite it was a disaster: the former child star moved into petty crime before the decade was out. The ex-bassist had already spent time inside and was awaiting a court appearance for drug possession when he suffered a freakish domestic accident. Waite collapsed at a friend’s house, hitting his head and dying instantly from the impact: a post mortem revealed that not drugs but an undiagnosed viral infection had caused the initial blackout. In 2003, Seaton took surviving members of Musical Youth – who surely by then barely fitted the description – back out on tour.

Thursday 25

Toy Caldwell

(Spartanburg, South Carolina, 13 November 1947)

The Marshall Tucker Band

(Various acts)

‘There’s a big space in the world only Toy could fill.’

Charlie Daniels

Steeped in Southern values, guitarist Toy Talmadge Caldwell Jr went against the grain by playing covers of ‘British invasion’ tunes in a band called The Rants. His father was a known local musician, so it was unsurprising when both Toy and his bassist brother Tommy – previously in a Spartanburg band called New Generation – joined forces in Toy Factory, the first incarnation of what would become The Marshall Tucker Band. After a spell in the marines – during which time he was badly injured – Caldwell returned to South Carolina and his music. Expanding the line-up in 1971, the band – now the Caldwells, Doug Gray (vocals), George McCorkle (lead guitar), Jerry Eubanks (sax) and drummer Paul Riddle (there was no ‘Marshall Tucker’) – blended country and rock to fashion their own brand of the deep-fried Southern rock made popular by other acts such as The Allman Brothers. With Toy Caldwell’s writing driving the project, an eponymous debut album on Capricorn turned gold in 1973, and all appeared rosy for a group that appealed to two generations of music lovers. Indeed, the seventies were very kind to the band: their numerous albums performed well, tours sold out and the odd hit single – such as ‘Heard It in a Love Song’ (1977) – kept the coffers nicely topped up.

In 1980, though, matters were to take a tragic turn with the deaths of both of Caldwell’s brothers in quick succession. In March of that year, a younger (non-musician) brother, Tim, died in a car crash, and Tommy was killed in
his
car just a month later (
April 1980).
The affairs of The Marshall Tucker Band were understandably lower key following this traumatic period, with Caldwell going on to session work after the group’s eventual split in 1985. In the last years of his life, the guitarist suffered profoundly from bronchial problems exacerbated by his predilection for cocaine: this eventually came home to roost with a complete respiratory collapse. Caldwell, who’d been suffering from influenza, returned from a visit to his doctor and died in his sleep. Married with two daughters, Caldwell had just finished his second album. On the day of his death, he’d been due to play a fundraiser in honour of his late friend Ronnie Van Zant (
October 1977),
of fellow Southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd.