Rolling Obituary Thread: 2015

What now for Orville? RIP Keith.

Srsly tho, ventriloquists are invariably shit but this guy was really fucking good at it.

Yeah, he was actually a pretty solid vent. Saw the latest Count Arthur Strong live show the other week where he has a vent section called Sulky Monkey which ripped off his own Little Tiny Tut but seemed also influenced by Cuddles.

Andrew Lesnie (Australian cinematographer, shot the Babe films and all six of Peter Jackson's Tolkien adaptations):

http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2015/04/28/98091-r-i-p-andrew-lesnie/

Suzanne Crough, who played the young daughter Tracy Partridge in the Partridge Family.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/partridge-family-star-suzanne-crough-dies/

aw

https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6553550/ben-e-king-dead-76-stand-by-me-singer

Ruth Rendell
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-31731722

Star Trek's Grace Lee Whitney: http://io9.com/rip-grace-lee-whitney-star-treks-yeoman-janice-rand-1701960741

http://bandwidth.wamu.org/junkyard-band-bassist-dies-in-motorcycle-crash/

Washington DC go-go funk bassist and manager Derek Anthony “House” Colquitt

ugh

I'm always surprised by how old the star trek cast are now

http://www.nola.com/music/index.ssf/2015/05/travis_trumpet_black_hill_risi.html

Travis 'Trumpet Black' Hill, rising New Orleans trumpeter, has died at 28

By Alison Fensterstock, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
on May 04, 2015 at 3:05 PM, updated May 05, 2015 at 2:16 AM

Errol Brown :-(

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-32613573

Jim Wright, good ol' Texan House bastard

http://www.dallasnews.com/obituary-headlines/20150506-former-u.s.-house-speaker-jim-wright-dead-at-92.ece

The last known surviving member of the German engineering team that designed the rocket that took US astronauts to the Moon has died in Alabama.

Oscar Holderer, who was 95, suffered a stroke last week and did not recover, his son Michael said.

Mr Holderer was one of about 120 engineers who moved to the US after World War Two, bringing technology used in the German V2 rocket.

They played a key role in the Saturn V rocket used in the 1969 Moon landing.

The team, led by Wernher von Braun, was part of a project called Operation Paperclip that transferred technology used in Germany's V2 and other rockets to the US.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32620119

wow. rip

95 is a damn good innings

"we aimed for the stars... and occasionally hit London"

"we aimed for London... and occasionally hit stars... I said stars"

are there any good books on paperclip? i know most of the story but am interested in the nuts & bolts...it's such a crazy story

that sounded glib..."crazy"....I just mean all the shady/illegal clandestine acrobatics they had to pull to even do it

are there any good books on paperclip? i know most of the story but am interested in the nuts & bolts...it's such a crazy story

Annie Jacobsen's book Operation Paperclip came out last year. Worth reading and certainly better than her Area 51 book. One element to Paperclip that I wasn't fully aware of is that rocket scientists weren't the only priority. Duh, it was the entire German offensive technical capability - chemical, biological, the whole thing.

NYT review: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/books/review/operation-paperclip-by-annie-jacobsen.html

thx Elvis!

Thanks, ET. Steered clear of that OP book because that Area 51 book seemed so bad.

my dad was a data programmer starting in the early 60s and worked in huntsville for a few years for the program. Not on any kind of cloak and dagger level obv. My mom hated huntsville and they moved to missouri in time to have me in 1970.

I grew up in Huntsville, and my dad was an aerospace engineer for a NASA contractor, so this kind of stuff has surrounded me my whole life. Even the local entertainment arena is named after Von Braun. I really know none of the details, though, so I might pick this book up as well.

I heard Jacobsen interviewed on the radio and she noted that while recently released records made clear that many of the Germans brought over were hardcore Nazis (who were not merely designing V2s and following orders in order to stay alive themselves), she was not sure about Holderer's racial, political, etc. beliefs

Johnny Gimble

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/famed-country-fiddler-johnny-gimble-dies-89-30929692

Elizabth Wilson, Tony-winning actress who played Benjamin's mother in The Graduate

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/elizabeth-wilson-dead-character-actress-794706

Artist Chris Burden, 69, melanoma.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/culture/la-et-chris-burden-dies-20150510-story.html#page=1

The last known surviving member of the German engineering team that designed the rocket that took US astronauts to the Moon has died in Alabama.
Oscar Holderer, who was 95, suffered a stroke last week and did not recover, his son Michael said.
...
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32620119

I just belatedly clicked the link and the article now says "A member of the German engineering team"; did they find a still-surviving member?

(Interesting story either way, might well check that book out. Thanks Elvis.)

Joanne Carson, ex-wife of Johnny and a writer/entertainer herself:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/11/arts/television/joanne-carson-talk-show-host-and-second-wife-of-johnny-carson-dies-at-83.html

RIP Franz Wright

...and now B.B. King...

BB and Ben E within a fortnight of each other.

Aw. My dad was really, truly shit at running a blues bar, but he once said it had all been worth it to have BB King call him Big Mike.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/b-b-king-blues-legend-dead-at-89-20150515

RIP

Elisabeth Bing, "mother" of the Lamaze birthing revolution

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/18/elisabeth-bing-lamaze-pioneer-dead-at-100/

https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6568888/bruce-lundvall-blue-note-records-veteran-beloved-label-executive-dead-at-79

A self-described "failed saxophone player," Bruce took an entry level marketing job at Columbia Records in 1960 and over the following two decades rose to lead the North American division of the label, signing artists including Dexter Gordon, Herbie Hancock, Stan Getz, Wynton Marsalis & Willie Nelson. After launching the Elektra/Musician label in 1982, he received the offer of a lifetime in 1984 when EMI approached him about reviving Blue Note Records which had been dormant for several years. He jumped at the chance, partnering with producer Michael Cuscuna to bring back the label's earlier stars like Jimmy Smith, McCoy Tyner, Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson & Jackie McLean, and signing new artists including Dianne Reeves, Cassandra Wilson, Michel Petrucciani, John Scofield, Charlie Hunter and Medeski Martin & Wood.

​

Under Bruce’s stewardship Blue Note established itself as the most-respected and longest-running jazz label in the world. He presided over a prosperous nearly-30-year period of the label's history, reaching commercial heights with artists including Bobby McFerrin, Us3, Norah Jones, Al Green and Amos Lee, while recording some of the most important jazz artists of our time including Joe Lovano, Greg Osby, Jason Moran, Robert Glasper, Ambrose Akinmusire, Don Pullen, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Terence Blanchard, Jacky Terrasson, and many others.

Happy Rockefeller, second wife of Nelson and a likely impediment to his presidential ambition

“Have we come to the point where a governor can desert his wife and children, and persuade a young woman to abandon her four children and husband?” former senator Prescott Bush (R-Conn.) told the New York Times at the time. “Have we come to the point where one of the two great parties will confer its greatest honor on such a one? I venture to hope not.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/20/happy-rockefeller-dies-at-88-a-symbol-of-old-political-taboos/

i waited on lundvall once in a restaurant and we talked for a half hour about music before his date got there. he was super excited about how this new woman was going to have a hugely popular album and really put him back on the map. it was norah jones. He took my address and then sent me a box of blue note cds. RIP, real class act.

Michael Montano of Filth passed away. The Shit Split and Crimpshrine were very important to teenaged me

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/CultureSpyBlog/archives/2015/05/20/michael-mike-o-the-psycho-montano-of-filth-died-last-monday

edit: Strychnine, not Crimpshrine duh

http://www.soultracks.com/story-louis-johnson-dies

Louis Johnson, the renowned bass player who was one-half of the popular musical group The Brothers Johnson, has reportedly died at age 60. Both as a member of the sibling duo and as a session musician, Johnson was lauded as one of the great bass players of his generation. His slap-bass style earned him the nickname "Thunder Thumbs" and brought a fresh sound that was just right for the emerging funk music scene of the 70s and early 80s.

Aw man so young! Rip

Love their version of strawberry letter 23 so fucking much

Terry Sue-Patt aka Benny from Grange Hill
http://www.itv.com/news/2015-05-22/grange-hill-actor-terry-sue-patt-has-died-aged-50/

:(

60s pop singer Lynn 'Twinkle' Ripley
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3093638/Sixties-pop-starlet-said-no-Mick-Jagger.html