Context: I was born in ‘74. Cash, Haggard, Petty and Cornell have been the worst for me. Having dealt with suicide in my immediate family, Cornell’s passing has been particularly rough to process.
George Harrison context - born 1964, Aussie working for over a year in UK, knew he was unwell, heard of his passing, Top Of The Pops (UK TV) that night (or the next night ?) had special guests Travis do Here Comes The Sun live in studio, as a tribute I shed a tear or two.
John Lennon. I was 16 years old, a junior in high school. I remember how surreal it was when I heard he was killed. Real gut punch.
Duane Allman Berry Oakley Ronnie Van Zant Stacy Sutherland Keith Moon John Lennon ( most affected by ) Felix Pappalardi Dennis Wilson Stevie Ray Vaughan ... each of them too young
Tom Petty affected me most...but when I was younger, John Lennon's death was traumatic as well as John Denver, Jim Croce and Andy Gibb
John Lennon 1. Because he was a Beatle 2. He was murdered Buddy Holly..because of what could have been.
John Lennon. I still loathe when that time of the year comes, never really truly gotten over it, like a piece of my soul was ripped out.
Karen Carpenter's passing affected me the most because I was still very much into their music. When I bought "The Carpenters-Yesterday Once More" laserdisc, it was my first time seeing those music videos. When "Those Good Old Dreams" came on, I was shocked at how Karen looked. In 2002 "The Carpenters-Gold" DVD was released & it was just a retitled "Y.O.M.". I'm glad I have it in my collection.
David Bowie's death affected me the most. Chris Cornell's was a close second. I still can't believe they're both gone. In third place would be Dolores O'Riordan. Her death was especially distressing for me because she was relatively young and she was a woman.
I just bought the Jack Bruce anthology Sunshine Of Your Love: A Life In Music. What an unmatched talent! I was only vaguely aware of Cream when he died (though, the night before, I had watched a psychedelic rock documentary and told myself I needed to start listening to Cream), but the more of his work I hear, the more I realize what an incredible loss it is. Allan Holdsworth too - he had just released his box set, it was doing well, he was finally getting the respect and the credit he deserved from a larger audience, and then... gone. I saw "Holdsworth" trending on Twitter, and when something I like is trending on Twitter, it can never be good news. It hit me like a ton of bricks - another guy you just expect to be around forever.
When it is publicly known that a performer has a terminal diagnosis and his/her days are numbered, it's not quite as big a blow as something that comes out of the blue. Although I'm sad that they're gone, I at least had time to psychologically prepare for the deaths of George Harrison, Frank Zappa, Robin Gibb, and Warren Zevon. Note that for the last 10 years, I have been psychologically preparing for the death of Gordon Lightfoot, but it apparently isn't as imminent as I thought it was.
Over lunch about 2 hours ago, I had a Lennon Legend CD on the player track Happy X'mas War is over and commented to my wife that his death is so tragic and it still gets me choked up ....
Most recently, Geri Allen whose music I love, and I had seen her live several times over the past 25 years. Also, Greg Allman. I never saw him live, and only became a big fan of Greg and ABB in the past 10 years, but his passing seemed to leave a vacuum, and now I am playing his music more than ever.
Herman Brood, so unexpected. He jumped of the Hilton hotel because the drugs did not help him anymore
Perhaps Ray Manzarek. I was lucky enough to see him play with Robby Krieger... maybe back in 2012. He was not only a great musician, but an ambassador for one of the greatest bands of all time. I've heard you can only trust yourself and the first 6 Black Sabbath albums. For me, it's the first 6 Doors albums.
as I said before, this was right as I was getting into Stereolab, and I was just gutted ... but was so proud of the inspired follow up tribute "Margererine Eclipse"
