STUDS TERKEL - Died Oct 31, age 96. Chicago's favorite son. Author, blacklisted in the 50s, radio host for almost 50 years (Dylan was a guest at his genesis), Pulitzer Prize winner. There is just has too much to him for me to thumbnail it here.
JIMMY CARL BLACK - Drummer and "The Indian Of The Group" from The Mothers Of Invention died Nov 1, age 70, from lung cancer. He was very vocal about Zappa's shitty treatment of the band, but willfully rejoined him for awhile after being kicked out. Also lead the band "Geronimo Black" and was a member of The Grandmothers, a band made up of (you guessed it) Mothers alumni.
YMA SUMAC - November 1, age 83, also cancer. Dig her pic at the top of the post. She was an other-worldly exotic vocalist with a 200-octave range (would I lie?). In recent years she was conveniently lumped in with the ultra-lounge/exotica scene, but was most active from the 50s to the early 60s, same time frame as Martin "Quiet Village" Denny, another exotica figurehead. It is rumored that rather than Peruvian, she was really Amy Camus from Brooklyn, and that her agent or studio moguls flipped the name around for extra exotic strangeness.
BYRON LEE - He of "...& The Dragonaires" fame. What you'd probably know him for most is the song "Jamaican Ska" that ol' Annette sings in "Back To The Beach". Or maybe "Tiny Winey" if you pay any attentiion to the steel band on Caribbean cruises. Well, he was for sure a Calypso King. He started back in 1956, those pre-ska days of Mento music, and he more or less rolled with the changes all the way through reggae, all the while still doing calypso & soca. He was active up until his death from cancer on November 4 at the age of 73. He was a bad-ass cat.
MICHAEL CRICHTON - Nov 4, age 68, cancer. He's the one who gave us Andromeda Strain (not the actual strain, tho), Westworld, Congo, Jurassic Park, and he also created ER.
and finally, ...
RUDY RAY MOORE - Yeah, that's right, Dolemite! This guy's gettin' oral sex in a limo when he gets picked up from prison! (in the movie Dolemite, that is, although who knows?) He was around since the 50s, doing Redd Foxx-style standup (no, not Sanford-type stuff; this was the original x-rated deal) and he was a soul singer, too. But we know him best as the pimp/hustler/player called Dolemite. He had problems with diabetes (gulp) and died at the age of 81 on Oct 19.
OK, OK, now take five, willya?
2 comments:
totally not true about yma sumacs' name. she was not from brooklyn either.
4 or 5 octave range...
dolemite---- written, produced by and starring rudy ray moore. he musta been the tyler perry of blaxploitation films.
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