Posted on 03/24/2014 4:13:53 PM PDT by a fool in paradise
Dave Brockie, founder and lead singer of outlandish metal band Gwar, died Sunday at the age of 50. The news was first reported by Richmond outlet Style Weekly and confirmed by the band's manager Jack Flanagan.
"It is with a saddened heart, that I confirm my dear friend Dave Brockie, artist, musician, and lead singer of GWAR passed away at approximately 6:50 p.m. EST Sunday, March 23, 2014," Flanagan said. "His body was found Sunday by his bandmate at his home in Richmond, VA. Richmond authorities have confirmed his death and next of kin has been notified. A full autopsy will be performed. My main focus right now is to look after my bandmates and his family. More information regarding his death shall be released as the details are confirmed."
Police were called to the singer's Richmond home Sunday night after responding to a call by Brockie's roommate. Brockie had already died by the time police arrived. Foul play is not suspected at this time, but a cause of death has yet to be determined.
"Dave was one of the funniest, smartest, most creative and energetic persons I've known," former Gwar bassist Mike Bishop told the paper. "He was brash sometimes, always crass, irreverent, he was hilarious in every way. But he was also deeply intelligent and interested in life, history, politics and art."
"I wish it was a joke," added former band member Chris Bopst. "Everyone is in shock."
Brockie had been in a punk band named Death Piggy that staged crude plays when he founded Gwar in 1984. After meeting band member Hunter Jackson, who had created props for Death Piggy and began work on the film Scumdogs of the Universe, Brockie used the outlandish costumes created for the film to form the joke group Gwaaarrrgghhlllgh. After numerous lineup changes and the shortening of the band name, Brockie dissolved Death Piggy and led Gwar, who released their debut album Hell-O in 1988.
The satirical metal band quickly earned a following for its macabre, over-the-top costumes and scatological, offensive lyrics, fashioning themselves interplanetary warriors descended from aliens who arrived on Earth to enslave and slaughter the human race. The band celebrated their 30th anniversary in 2014, having released their 13th album, Battle Maximus, last year.
"His penchant for scatological humors belied a lucid wit," said Bishop. "He was a criminally underrated lyricist and hard rock vocalist, one of the best, ever! A great frontman, a great painter, writer, he was also a hell of a bass guitarist. I loved him. He was capable of great empathy and had a real sense of justice."
In 2011, Cory Smoot, the Gwar guitarist known as Flattus Maximus, was found dead by his bandmates as they prepared to cross the border into Canada. Smoot, who joined the long-running band in 2002, had the longest tenure in the Maximus role and co-produced 2006's Beyond Hell and 2009's Lust in Space.
Something smells.........
One of the most entertaining shows I ever went to... was at the Palladium in NYC. We rode in from Princeton Junction on NJ Transit... the ride back late that night was interesting... my buddy and I were completely covered in dried fake blood from the stage show.
"Huh? Who?"
Now he can be reunited with the Cuttlefish of Cthulhu!
RIP
Dear Parents,
We’d like to have your children raised on music written by emotionally unstable individuals fixated on sex and violence.
Thanks,
The Media
Beavis and Butthead is how I know of them too.
Megadeth is more my speed.
Pure talent and class have largely moved to the indie market, thanks to electronic distribution and the plunging cost of building a studio as good as what Sun Records used back in the day.
When Sun launched Elvis, Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash, their Memphis studio cost between three and five million dollars. By nineteen ninety eight a studio of comparable capability could be put together for thirteen thousand.
So today, people with real talent forgo the RIAA and retain all the rights to their own music. Not everyone with talent makes it without a day job (se as ever) but on the other hand breaking even takes a smaller number of sales unburdened by the record companies and the costs of the old distribution network.
NNNOOOOOOOoooooo... RIP
-— That is easily done because GWAR is really more of a performance art ensemble than a band. -—
Performance “art.”
“His penchant for scatological humors belied a lucid wit,” said Bishop.
So he talked crap?
The established guys these days do all they can to avoid production studios and the costs and hassle associated with them. Just the other day Dave Mustaine was posting pics of his new soundboard and equipment to twitter.
He can record at will without having to go to a studio for weeks or months. He can lay down tracks when he feels like it and the other band members can come and do the same. He says the coolest part is that they can record from different locations as if they were in the same studio.
May he rest in Gpeace.
OO design principles at work.
Saddam a gogo was the Bevis & Butthead GWAR video that led me to their music
Saddam a gogo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CliBi0DpA2s
slap you around http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCSKBiv9kCw
Damn That Money was a DBX Dave Brockie Experience production
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFzg5kaU_2g&feature=kp
Law enforcement sources tell TMZ ... Brockie — a.k.a. Oderus Urungus — was found early Sunday morning dead, sitting upright in a chair at his Richmond, VA home.
We’re told foul play is not suspected ... and one law enforcement sources told us, “There were no drugs found, as far as I know.”
Another law enforcement source tells us it was not a suicide. No note was found. Brockie was found by his roommate.
http://www.tmz.com/2014/03/24/gwar-frontman-dav-brockie-dead-dies/#ixzz2wvuifn3Q
I always enjoyed his appearances on Red Eye.
Maybe they could hire one of the ex-Rolling Stones to replace him. Wouldn’t even hafta wear a mask!
RIP, a pretty funny rock band. My favourite is the very sincere 80s hairband-esque ballad ‘the road behind.’
Here’s the road behind video, still cracks me up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWKrM5h4QYw&feature=kp
Freegards.
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