The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars (290 page)

Wednesday 11

Mark Spoon

(Markus Löffel - Frankfurt am Mainz, 27 November 1966)

Jam & Spoon

(Tokyo Ghetto Pussy/Storm/Big Room)

Markus Loffel took the English translation of his name on his way to becoming one of the most prominent DJs in the industry. Somewhat aptly, Spoon started his working life as a cook in his hometown of Frankfurt before mixing of a very different variety took his fancy. His late eighties/early nineties work saw remixes for the receding Frankie Goes to Hollywood and the emerging Moby, while his discovery of Nigerian musician Alban Nwapa gave Europe a major new star (Dr Alban).

Spoon is best remembered, though, for his work with Rolf Ellmer – the ‘Jam’ of the electronic duo’s moniker – with whom he issued the debut album
BreaksUnit1
in 1991. Over the next few years, Jam & Spoon began to clean up on the continent with a series of hit records, most notably ‘Right in the Night’ (1995) with US-born singer Plavka Lonich, which broke the UK Top Ten. The pairing charted under a variety of aliases, such as Tokyo Ghetto Pussy, who hit worldwide with ‘Everybody on the Floor (Pump It)’. The biggest smash, however, was a remixing of fellow countryman Giorgio Moroder’s ‘The Chase’, which claimed an unlikely US dance number one for Jam & Spoon in 2000.

Two years on, the track ‘Be Angeled’ almost emulated this feat, though ultimately it became the title of a tribute record to Spoon: aged just thirty-nine, he died from a heart attack at his Berlin flat.

Thursday 19

Wilson Pickett

(Prattville, Alabama, 18 March 1941)

The Falcons

(The Violinaires)

Though he boasted a voice rich with passion in his adult life, Wilson Pickett barely appeared capable when a young boy. The meek Pickett was allegedly terrified of his overly strict mother, leaving home to live with his father in Detroit at the age of fourteen. As a reaction to this supposedly abusive upbringing, Pickett worked relentlessly on his robust vocal style with Baptist church choirs, touring the country with The Violinaires – a quartet that performed alongside Sam Cooke’s Soul Stirrers, among other gospel units. In time, Pickett followed the path cleared by Cooke (and Aretha Franklin) as gospel singers began to make serious inroads in secular music. Pickett made the transition with ease with The Falcons – the band, after all, already boasted the talents of Mack Rice and Eddie Floyd. Their ‘I Found a Love’ (1962) climbed America’s R & B charts steadily, while also finding a place on the Hot 100, thanks to its crossover appeal. (Another single, ‘If You Need Me’ was even covered by the young Rolling Stones.) This success prompted solo recordings, as Pickett’s newfound confidence began to soar. Atlantic Records – and the general public – were not slow in catching on to this new star.

‘The Wicked’ Wilson Pickett sounded older and wiser than a cherubic twenty-four-year-old on Stax/Fame studio recordings like ‘In the Midnight Hour’ (1965), ‘634-5789 (Soulsville, USA)’ and ‘Land of 1,000 Dances’ (both 1966). All three were R & B chart-toppers, the latter a million-seller that also made the pop Top Ten. ‘In the Midnight Hour’, however, is nowadays recognised as Pickett’s masterpiece; a funky, chugging, horn-laden slice of Southern soul. That it has been recorded by major artists as diverse as The Grateful Dead and The Jam serves as testament to the song’s timeless appeal.

Without reaching the heights of these early triumphs, Pickett continued to record for the remainder of the decade, though to maintain a profile he’d often have to record covers himself to stay on the charts: an example of this is the impressive hit version of The Beatles’ ‘Hey Jude’ (1969) featuring Duane Allman on guitar. Then, with the hits not rolling off the presses as before, Pickett’s behaviour unfortunately grew more worrisome to his friends. Perhaps stifled as a child, he had an aggressive streak that had informed his music positively, though gave way to several episodes of public disorder in his later personal life. Pickett had a fascination with firearms that saw him arrested in his forties for carrying a loaded shotgun while driving; in 1991, Pickett was then arrested following a bizarre incident in which he drove across the mayor of Englewood, New Jersey’s front lawn yelling death threats. A year on, there was an arrest for an alleged assault on his partner and then imprisonment for drink-driving. (Ironically, this all coincided with the star’s induction into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.) Happily, the setback was the spur to a return (some of the way) to his rightful place at soul’s top table with a series of recordings, including 1999’s Grammy-nominated
It’s Harder Now
and a seemingly endless sequence of live dates. Pickett also earned significant royalties as a songwriter.

By 2004, though, Wilson Pickett could not continue the excruciating workload he’d set for himself. Suffering from a number of health issues, the singer was confined to a Virginia hospital bed for the last year of his life, never getting to record the gospel album he’d promised himself. The funeral following his passing from a heart attack prompted a vast turnout and a sermon from longtime friend Little Richard, a gesture that would have pleased Pickett to no end. How he’d have reacted to being buried next to his mother is, however, another matter entirely.

Friday 20

Dave Lepard

(David Hellman - Uppsala, Sweden, 28 May 1980)

Crashdiet

‘You live in chaos, depend on welfare, are an addict - and things fucking suck.’

Dave Lepard sums it up in 2005

Eighties throwbacks Crashdiet looked to be on the verge of some special times when the band became the first sleaze-metal act signed to a major (Universal) in ten years. A young and impressionable group of musicians, they never enjoyed any kind of real payback for the hard work put in – and for singer/guitarist Dave Lepard, it became all too much to bear.

Formed in Stockholm in 2002 (after one previous false start), Crashdiet – Lepard, Martin Sweet (guitar), Peter London (bass) and Eric Young (drums)– looked set to storm Europe with the release of the 2005 album
Rest in Sleaze.
The set gave them an unexpected Top Twenty entry in their native country and spawned a number of airplay hits. But the front man was blowing the small amount of money he was making on hard drugs. Falling under the spell of heroin, Lepard began to alienate his bandmates, who decided by the end of the year to abandon him and continue under a new name come 2006. Before this move could be implemented, however, he disappeared. Unheard from for almost a month, Lepard was found by a friend who broke into his apartment; the singer apparently hanged himself. His estranged bandmates were quoted as saying, ‘as a band member – but most of all as a person– we will miss him for all eternity’.

Sunday 29

Brent Dowe

(Point District, Jamaica, 29 June 1946)

The Melodians

The Melodians were one of Jamaica’s earliest and most popular rocksteady acts, predating even The Wailers with their sweet, languid harmonies. The group – comprising Tony Brevett (whose brother Lloyd played bass with rivals The Skatalites), writer Renford Cogle, lead singer Brent Gayford Dowe and Trevor McNaughton – emerged from the back streets of Greenwich Town in 1965 to almost immediate acclaim. The ubiquitous Clement ‘Coxsone’ Dodd was behind the group’s earliest recordings, including Studio One releases ‘Lay It On’ and ‘Let’s Join Hands Together’ (both 1966), before a sharp diversion took them to the Treasure Isle label of rival Duke Reid. By 1968 The Melodians were a hot property indeed, though despite hits like ‘You Have Caught Me’ they chose to jump ship a second time after some financial squabbles with the owner. In the next few years they recorded with both the Links and Tramp labels, with producer Sonia Pottinger honing their sweet sound, most notably on the great ‘Swing and Dine’ (1968).

At the core was Dowe, whose pure voice attracted yet another Jamaican music legend in producer Leslie Kong, who (up until his untimely death) saw to it that The Melodians finally enjoyed an international audience. One of the group’s key tunes at this point was their reworking of Psalm 137, best known as ‘Rivers of Babylon’, a song used in Jimmy Cliff’s movie
The Harder They Come
– and most famously recorded by Boney M, a 1978 UK chart-topper. (The Melodians’ only chart success in Britain otherwise had been 1970’s ‘It’s My Delight’, though this peaked considerably lower.) Kong’s passing saw to it that the inconsistent, if impressive, run of producers was to continue into the seventies: for Dowe, however, it was over by 1973 as he broke away for a comparatively anonymous solo career. Although the group occasionally reformed after this, the time had very much passed for The Melodians in terms of records, though their live performances were always met with verve. It was just ahead of one such appearance at the Jamaican Prime Minister’s residence that Brent Dowe became the latest name musician to suffer a fatal heart attack in 2006. Original members Brevett and McNaughton continue to tour and record in his honour.

FEBRUARY

Tuesday 7

Elton Dean

(Nottingham, 28 October 1945)

Soft Machine

(Various acts)