Singer

Died On This Date (February 15, 2009) Joe Cuba / Father Of Latin Boogaloo

Joe Cuba (Born Gilberto Calderon)
April 22, 1931 – February 15, 2009

joe-cubaJoe Cuba was a Puerto Rican conga player who has been called the “Father of Latin Boogaloo.”  He began playing professionally when he was 19 years old, and 12 years later, made his first recording.  His career spanned nearly 60 years.  During the ’60s, Cuba became very popular in New York City after he started merging the R&B with Afro-Cuban percussion.  It became a style of music called Latin Boogaloo.  Joe Cuba died as the result of a bacterial infection on February 15, 2009.  He was 77 years old.

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El Alcalde del Barrio - Joe Cuba

Died On This Date (February 14, 2010) Doug Fieger / Leader Of The Knack

Doug Fieger
August 20, 1952 – February 14, 2010

Photo by David Plastik – Click To Order Quality Prints – Discount code: 10OFF

Doug Fieger is best remembered as the lead singer and primary songwriter for Detroit new wave band, the Knack.  Formed in 1978, with Berton Averre, Prescott Niles, and Bruce Gary,  the group seemingly came out of nowhere with a huge hit, “My Sharona,” that has since become a musical icon of the era.  With their power pop songs and clean-cut image during a time when punk and heavy metal were battling for the attention of young teens, the Knack offered an alternative that was more akin to the early Beatles.  Their debut album, Get The Knack, that also included their second hit single, “Good Girls Don’t,” sat at the top of the U.S. album chart for six weeks while selling over 2 million copies.  It’s follow-up, …But The Little Girls Understand went gold, but for the most part, the band’s huge fan base was beginning to move on.   The Knack broke up in 1982, but reformed a few times over the years ever since.  Before his tenure with the Knack, Fieger played bass and sang lead for ’70s country rock band, Sky.  He also played bass in German prog band, Triumvirat during 1974.  Doug Fieger, age 57,  died of cancer on February 14, 2010.  He had been battling the disease for a few years.

Thanks to Craig Rosen of number 1 albums for the assist.

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Get the Knack - The Knack

Died On This Date (February 14, 2010) Lee Freeman / Co-Founder Of Strawberry Alarm Clock

Lee Freeman
November 8, 1949 – February 14, 2010

Lee Freeman is best remembered as a founding guitarist and co-lead singer for ’60s psychedelic rock band, Strawberry Alarm Clock.  Formed in Glendale, California in 1967, the band scored a handful of charting hits, including their biggest, “Incense and Peppermints.”  Freeman was still in high school when, in 1965, he co-founded and sang lead for local garage band, Thee Sixpence.  Within a couple of years, the group evolved into Strawberry Alarm Clock, a name chosen to pay tribute to the Beatles’ “Strawberry Fields Forever.” “Incense and Peppermints” took a bit longer than most singles to become popular, but by the time it did, it propelled the group’s debut album to #11 on the Billboard charts.  It ended up being their only album to chart.  Over the next couple of years, they shared the bill with the likes of the Who, Country Joe & The Fish, the Beach Boys, and Jimi Hendrix.  Strawberry Alarm Clock disbanded in 1971, but reunited permanently in 1982.  In recent months, Freeman and the group were working on new material for potential release on a label owned by Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins.   Lee Freeman died on February 14, 2010 following a long struggle with cancer.  He was 60.

Thanks to Bryan for the help

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Strawberry Alarm Clock

Died On This Date (February 13, 2002) Waylon Jennings / Country Music Icon

Waylon Jennings
June 15, 1937 – February 13, 2002

waylon-jenningsWaylon Jennings was a hugely influential country singer, songwriter and musician who was one of the pioneers of the genre’s “outlaw” movement of the ’70s.  Jennings learned to play the guitar and formed his own band before he even hit his teen years.  One of Jennings’ first jobs in music was as a disc jockey at a local Texas radio station.  It was there that he met an up-and-coming rockabilly singer named Buddy Holly.  Before long, Jennings was playing bass in Holly’s band.  On February 3, 1959, Jennings career path suffered a tragic setback when Holly, J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson, and Ritchie Valens all perished in a plane crash while they were on tour of the Midwest.  The accident, which has been memorialized as “the day the music died,” almost claimed Jennings’ life as well.  At the last minute Jennings gave up his seat to Richardson who hadn’t been feeling well.  As the musicians were boarding the plane, Holly quipped to Jennings, “I hope your ‘ol bus freezes up.”  Jennings’ retort, “Well, I hope your ‘ol plane crashes” haunted him for the rest of his life.   Jennings took a hiatus from performing and moved to Arizona where he went back to DJ’ing.  By the mid ’60s, he was making music again.     As he began building a following, Jennings met resistance from the Nashville music community for in part, not using the usual session players for his records.  Jennings was adamant that he would only use his traveling band in the studio.  And the rock edge to his music fell outside what was perceived as the “Nashville Sound,” a more slick country-pop.  This “outlaw” movement began to take hold as fellow country men like Willie Nelson, Billy Joe Shaver, Johnny Cash and Kris Kristofferson who preferred to hang on to country’s honky tonk roots.   Over the course of his career, Jennings released a series of top-selling and influential country records.  That list includes Honky Tonk Heroes, Waylon Live, Are You Ready For The Country Lonesome, On’ry and Mean, Good Hearted Woman, and Dreaming My Dreams.  His collaborations with the likes of Nelson, Jessi Colter, the Highwaymen and the Outlaws were critically and commercially acclaimed as well.  Jennings stayed active through the ’90s even as his health began to fail due to diabetes.  On February 13, 2002, the disease claimed Waylon Jennings’ life.  He was 64.

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Honky Tonk Heroes - Waylon Jennings

Died On This Date (February 13, 2010) Dale Hawkins / Rockabilly Pioneer; Wrote “Suzie Q”

Delmar “Dale” Hawkins
August 22, 1936 – February 13, 2010

Dale Hawkins was a singer, songwriter and guitarist who launched his career in Louisiana during the mid ’50s.   He was one of the earliest to take the rock and rockabilly of Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly and marry it with the deep Louisiana blues he grew up hearing around him.  It was the birth of swamp rock that would later reach the masses thanks to the likes of Elvin Bishop and Creedance Clearwater Revival.  In 1957, Hawkins released “Susie Q,” a single that took up both sides of the record.  It peaked at #27 on the singles chart but was eventually recognized by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as one of the 500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll.  The song has been since covered by the likes of the Rolling Stones, Gene Vincent, Johnny Rivers, the Velvet Underground, Bruce Springsteen, and most famously, Creedance Clearwater Revival in 1968.  Hawkins was reportedly the third artist ever to perform on American Bandstand and the first white person to perform at the Apollo Theater in Harlem.  During the late ’50s,  he hosted his own dance show for NBC-TV, The Dale Hawkins Show.  Later, he worked as a producer and label executive, most notably for RCA Records.  He began working as a social worker during the late ’80s.  In 2006, Dale Hawkins learned he had colon cancer which would be the ultimate cause of his death on February 13, 2010.  He was 73 years old.

Thanks to Ed Hardy for the assist.

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Dale Hawkins