Jordan
Punk Icon
Born 23 June 1955 Died of Bile Duct cancer in East Sussex, Seaford on Sunday April 3rd 2022 aged 66.
Nicky Tesco
The Members aged 66
The news was confirmed in a post on Tesco’s Facebook page, which simply said that Tesco had “left the building” and died on Saturday (February 26 2022). Unknown causes.
Richard H. Kirk
Cabaret Voltaire Aged 65
Died on September 21, 2021 of unknown causes.
Paul 'Candiflip' Blackwood
Guitarist in Anarchistwood aged 48
Found dead in a lake on Boxing Day 2020 in London after going missing.
Genesis P-Orridge
Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV aged 70
Died on March 14th 2020 in New York, U.S.
of Leukaemia
Dave Greenfield
Keyboardist in the Stranglers. Greenfield died on 3 May 2020, aged 71. He had been diagnosed with COVID-19 infection during the COVID-19 pandemic in England on 26. He was aged 71.
Walter Lure
The Heartbreakers, The Waldoes
Guitarist in the Heartbreakers aged 71.
Died on August 22, 2020 in the US of Liver Cancer.
Keith Flint
Vocalist in The Prodigy aged 49.
Died on March 4, 2019 in Great Dunmow, Essex, England from Suicide.
Bernie Tormé
Guitarist in the Bernie Torme band, Gillan, GMT, Desperado aged 66.
Died on March 17, 2019 London, UK from Pneumonia / Post-flu complications.
Mark E. Smith
Singer and founder of The Fall aged 60.
Died on January 24, 2018 in Prestwich, Greater Manchester, England of Lung and kidney cancer.
Todd Youth
Agnostic Front, Danzig.
Aged 47 died on October 27, 2018.
Cause unknown.
James Calvin Wilsey
From the Avengers aged 61.
Died on December 24, 2018 of Multiple organ failure.
AGENT PROVOCATEUR
Malcolm McLaren the svengali entrepreneur who bought the Sex Pistols to the worlds attention, the man who took credit for creating
punk died of Cancer.
McLaren aged 64 was synonymous with provocation, he would antagonise, irritate and
outrage a shocked public. A loveable rogue or
a unscrupulous despot? Whatever you think of him he was incredibly funny and a downright artistic genius. The art/rock scene will be a poorer place without his indulgence. When asked in in 2006 what he thought would be put on his epitaph he said...
"Thats a difficult one to guess at. I might be remembered as the most evil man who ever
walked the planet. Flip the coin and I could be remembered as an artistic genius that people didn't quite understand while I was alive. At a push I think my epitaph will include the words
"troublemaker", "childish", "everything this society hates" and "he made ugliness beautiful".
Malcolm McLaren was born on January 22nd,
1946. He died of Cancer on April 8th 2010.
Timo Kaltio
Hanoi Rocks, Cheap & Nasty, Cherry Bombz. Aged 61, Died on September 2, 2021 in Helsinki, Finland. Unknown causes.
Andy Gill
Gang of Four.
Aged 64 died on February 1, 2020 in London, England of Pneumonia and multiple organ failure.
Florian Schneider
Kraftwerk
Aged 73 died on April 21, 2020 in Düsseldorf, Germany of Cancer.
Joey Image
Misfits
Aged 63 died on June 1, 2020 of Liver cancer.
Lorna Doom
Bassplayer in the Germs aged 60.
Died on January 16, 2019 of Breast cancer.
Danny Kustow
Tom Robinson Band
Aged 63 died March 11, 2019 in the U.S. of Pneumonia and liver infection.
Pete Shelley
Guitarist/singer in Buzzcocks aged 63.
Shelley moved to Tallinn, Estonia, in 2012 with his second wife, Greta, an Estonian, preferring the less-hectic pace there to London where he had lived for nearly thirty years. He died there of a suspected heart attack on the morning of 6 December 2018.
Eddie Clarke
Guitarist in Motörhead, Fastway
Aged 67 died on January 10, 2018 of Pneumonia.
Randy Rampage
DOA and Annihilator
Aged 58 died on August 14, 2018 in Vancouver, Canada of a Heart attack.
RICH KID DIES!
16 May 1960 - 24 May 2010
Londoner Steve New (50) the former Whizzkid guitarist of the late 70's Rich Kids who reformed for a one off special in January of this year died on the 24th of May surrounded by family loved ones. Steve had been battling Cancer for a long time.
Steve came to attention at the age of 15 after
being asked to audition for the Sex Pistols as a second guitarist alongside Steve Jones. But
was refused the job because he wouldn't cut
his hair. When Pistols' bass player Glen
Matlock was ousted from the band, he invited
New to join his new group Rich Kids alongside Rusty Egan and former Slik singer Midge Ure. New also later played with Sid Vicious, Public
Image Ltd, Iggy Pop, Kim Fowley, and a solo Glen Matlock.
He would later prefer to be known as Stella
Nova and was the musical arranger/producer
in Beastellabeast along with vocalist Beatrice
Brown.
Nova faced terminal cancer in 2009, so he
played with a reformed Rich Kids in London in
January 2010 at a SOLD OUT benefit concert
for his family. He leaves behind two children and lots of girlfriends.
FOXY BOWS OUT!
Paul Fox, guitarist and co-songwriter with the
Ruts lost his battle against Cancer and died
on Sunday 21st October 2007. Paul "Foxy"
Fox aged 56 helped create some of the best
loved and most enduring work of the punk
era. The Ruts, who came together in 1977,
were among the best of the second wave of
British punk bands, inspired by the likes of
the Sex Pistols and the Clash.
BLITZED IN TEXAS!
Nige Miller guitarist from early 80's street Punk pioneers Blitz was tragically hit by a car and killed whilst trying to cross a highway outside Austin, Texas USA on Friday February 2nd 2007 following a show at Elmos venue. Nige was renowned for his blazing riffs that littered the bands early releases and was the only original member left after managing to get a band together to tour the States.
Thomas ‘Mensi’ Mensforth
singer in the Angelic Upstarts
Born 4 July 1956; died 10 December 2021
Aged 65 died from Covid-19
.Charismatic, outspoken frontman of the punk band Angelic Upstarts, pioneers of raw and raucous Oi music His rough, passionate Vocals were typical of Oi’s commitment to documenting the highs and lows of working-class life. Even within the noisy, raucous world of punk music, Thomas “Mensi” Mensforth stood out from the crowd. Forthright, outspoken and unswervingly political, he was the charismatic frontman of Angelic Upstarts from their formation in 1977 until his death, from Covid-19, aged 65.
The Upstarts, who had two Top 40 UK singles and three Top 40 albums in the late 1970s and early 80s, were pioneers of the subgenre of Oi music, which owed less to the suburban art school milieu from which some of the first wave of punk bands emerged and more to the council estates and football terraces with which Mensi was familiar. “We were living what other groups were writing about,” he said.
Like many of the early Oi protagonists, Mensi and the Upstarts were inspired by bands such as the Clash and the Sex Pistols, but were even more raw and musically unschooled than their idols. Mensi’s rough, passionate vocals, often delivered at breakneck speed and, at least in the early days, with more emphasis on the lyrics than the melody, were typical of Oi’s do-it-yourself commitment to documenting the highs and lows of working-class life.
Many of the songs he wrote were dismissed by the music press as little more than football chants – even his hero, the Clash’s Joe Strummer, accused him of being “a shouter, not a singer”. But Mensi’s heart-on-the sleeve compositions – anthems with titles such as We are the People, Police Oppression, Never ‘Ad Nothin’ and Kids on the Streets – generated a large and loyal base of fans, many of whom regarded him as a folk hero.
Mensi was born in South Shields, Tyne and Wear, where his father, Thomas, was a coalminer in the Westoe colliery and his mother, Dorothy (nee Smith), was a housewife. After schooling at Stanhope Road secondary modern he followed his father down the Westoe pit, but during that time 19-year-old Mensi was mesmerised by seeing the Clash on their 1977 White Riot tour. Later that year he formed Angelic Upstarts with Ray “Mond” Cowie (guitar) and Derek “Decca” Wade (drums), shipyard workers from the Brockley Whins estate where he lived, and Steve Forsten, a bricklayer, on bass guitar.
Their debut, self-financed single, The Murder of Liddle Towers (1978) – about a local man who had died in police custody – caused an immediate stir, while in 1979 their second release, I’m an Upstart, made it to No 31 on the UK singles chart.
Angelic Upstarts performing live for a television broadcast in 1981.
With the forceful presence of Mensi up front, the Upstarts quickly became a popular live attraction, although for a spell their gigs were magnets for violence, and their notoriety made it difficult to get bookings. Resorting to subterfuge, in April 1979 Mensi managed to secure an engagement at the local Acklington prison by convincing the chaplain that they were a religious group. Once set up on the prison stage, to the horror of the guards and the delight of 150 inmates, he unfurled a “Smash law and order” banner featuring a pig in a police helmet, and began to run through the band’s repertoire of anti-establishment songs, generating tabloid outrage in the process.
With help from Sham 69’s Jimmy Pursey, the Upstarts signed to Warner Bros. Following the success of their 1979 debut album Teenage Warning (its title track made it to No 29 in the singles chart and gained them an appearance on Top of the Pops), their next two albums, We Gotta Get Out of This Place (1980) and 2,000,000 Voices (1981), also sold well, with the latter peaking at No 32.
Mensi had initially expected the Upstarts to last three years – “one year getting known, one year at the top and one year on the slide” – but they proved to be remarkably resilient. After five more studio albums there was a hiatus in the late 80s when the band split and reformed on more than one occasion, before new albums – featuring various line-up changes but with Mensi always the linchpin – were issued in 1992, 2002, 2011 and 2015. Their most recent stage appearance was in September this year.
As time went on, Mensi’s songwriting developed more sophistication, but the lyrics remained as blunt as ever. A provocative, patriotic leftwinger, admirer of Arthur Scargill and an active supporter of the street-level Anti-Fascist Action group from the mid-80s onwards, he appeared to become even more angry and radical as he grew older, latterly taking to calling himself “Mensi Marx”.
Yet he was also a naturally canny entrepreneur and had a head for business sidelines, including in secondhand car dealing and as the owner of the Alexandra Hotel pub in Jarrow, which added to his living as a musician. “He was the biggest socialist in Oi and the only one who ended up minted,” joked the journalist Garry Bushell.
Outside music and business, Mensi had a complicated personal life that he blamed on “the rock’n’roll lifestyle”. He is believed to be survived by at least 16 children from various relationships.
THE GUARDIAN
Sylvain Sylvain
He was 69 and former guitarist in the New York Dolls.. His wife, Wanda O'Kelley Mizrahi, confirmed the musician's death to Rolling Stone. “As most of you know, Sylvain battled cancer for the past two and half years,” O'Kelley Mizrahi wrote in a statement on his Facebook page. “Though he fought it valiantly, yesterday he passed away from this disease.14 Jan 2021
Carol Clerk
Early 80's punk champion and music jourmnalist for Melody Maker passed
away on 03/13/10 – Carol Clerk, 55, saw
more of rock and roll than most of us can
only dream of. She was a news editor and
writer at some of the UK’s most esteemed
rock publications and hung out and drank a
few pints with the people who made the music.Carol Clerk (O'Brien) quietly passed away 13th March 2010. One of rock's finest
writers, a fantastic wife, wonderful friend,
amazing drinking companion and glorious
mother.
Throughout 2009, Carol bravely and quietly
battled breast cancer head on. She didn't
want her journalist or music business
colleagues to know of her struggle...
STOOGE DIES
Ron Asheton, who was found dead
on 6 January, 2009, was the musician whose scuzzy guitar, along with Iggy Pop's furious vocals, heralded the start of punk rock with The Stooges' self-titled debut album in 1969.
The nihilistic garage rock band were a commercial failure but their kinetic live performances germinated the punk movement that would grow steadily in New York and then London over the next decade.
It eventually resulted in world domination by
the likes of The Clash and Sex Pistols, the
latter covering The Stooges' No Fun at the
start of their career.
Asheton co-wrote the songs with wiry frontman Iggy Pop and played the sole guitar on The Stooges and 1970 follow-up Fun House, before switching to bass for the group's final album, Raw Power.
However, by this time he had been pushed out of song-writing duties by new guitarist James Williamson and was sacked shortly before the group disbanded in 1974.
In 1975 Asheton founded a band called The
New Order with two former Stooges and the
MC5's drummer. They released one album on
a low budget independent label. In late 1976
he joined experimental rock band Destroy All
Monsters.
In the 1980s he relocated to Australia to form
the band New Race, who played a mixture of
original garage rock and music from their former bands.
He acted in a handful of films in the early
1990s and in 2003 - following on from Iggy
Pop's solo success and an increased interest
in The Stooges' work since the punk explosion - he reunited with his former band as Iggy Pop & The Stooges for live shows and a new album in 2007.
Ronald Frank Asheton, who was born in Ann
Arbor, Michigan, on 17 July, 1948, died at the
age of 60 in his home in the same city. After
hearing about Asheton's death, Sex Pistol
Steve Jones said The Stooges were his
"blueprint for how to play guitar.
