Tag: 42

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Chi Cheng 4/2013

chi chengApril 13, 2013 – Chi Cheng was born on July 15th 1970 in Davis, California, to Jeanne and Yin Yan Cheng. His father, a prominent Stockton cardiologist, was a Chinese immigrant. Cheng graduated from Tokay High School and attended California State University in Sacramento, enrolling in 1989. He worked on campus, wrote poetry, and played as the original full time bassist of the alternative metal band Deftones from Sacramento, founded in 1988.

Deftones released seven albums, with three Platinum: Adrenaline, Around the Fur, and White Pony and one Gold certification for Deftones.

Their many hit singles include “Be Quiet and Drive (Far Away)”, “Change (In the House of Flies)”, “Minerva” and “Hole in the Earth”. Chi was also the author of a collection of poetry titled The Bamboo Parachute released in 2000 as a spoken word album. Cheng gave proceeds from the CD to various charities and to buy musical instruments for kids in the Sacramento area. He was a practicing Buddhist and maintained an interest in Taoism and Shamanism. In addition to his conversion to Buddhism during his college years, he also became a vegetarian.

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Bobby Ferrara 1/2008

Bobby FerraraJanuary 15, 2008 – Bobby Ferrara was born Robert Patrick Ferrara on July 22nd 1965 Bobby Ferrara in Queens Village, Long Island, New York.

He was in sixth grade when he started playing guitar and never received formal lessons. His major influences were Eddie van Halen and Kiss’s Ace Frehley and he practiced them 4 to 5 hours every day. He was a quiet introvert kid who loved his music and waited out his life for the right woman.
But those qualities made him an extraordinary shredder. His jaw-dropping solo flurries, wah-drenched fusillades and high-energy freakout got him New York’s Hot Licks guitar contest twice, and made him a world class guitarist.

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Philip Kramer 2/1995

philip taylor kramerFebruary 12, 1995 – Philip Kramer (Iron Butterfly) was born on July 12th 1952 in Youngstown, Ohio.

For a short period between 1974 and 1977, he was bassist for Iron Butterfly in their third reincarnation. Even though he was a solid bass thumper, his story on this rock and roll website only appears because his death was a longtime mystery with many stories of paranoia, related to his science career. During and after his music career he studied for and got a night school degree in aerospace engineering, after which he worked on the MX missile guidance system for a contractor of the US Department of Defense.

With the arrival of the Internet and the Worldwide Web he switched fields and studied fractal compression, facial recognition systems, and advanced communications. In 1990 he co-founded Total Multimedia Inc. with Randy Jackson, brother of Michael Jackson, to develop data compression techniques for CD-ROMs.

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Eddie Hazel 12/1992

eddiehazelDec 23, 1992 – Eddie Hazel was born in Brooklyn, New York on April 10, 1950 but grew up in Plainfield, New Jersey because his mother, Grace Cook, wanted her son to grow up in an environment without the pressures of drugs and crime that she felt pervaded New York City. Hazel occupied himself from a young age by playing a guitar, given to him as a Christmas present by his older brother. Hazel also sang in church. At age 12 he participated in backyard jams, which resulted in Nelson McGee and Hazel forming the Wonders who played around Plainfield in the mid sixties. By early 1967 Hazel’s reputation on guitar had taken him to work with producer George Blackwell in Newark.

In 1967  The Parliaments, a Plainfield-based doo wop band headed by George Clinton, had a hit record with “(I Wanna) Testify“. Clinton recruited a backing band for a tour, hiring Nelson as bassist, who in turn recommended Hazel as guitarist.

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Peter Tosh 9/1987

peter toshSeptember 11, 1987 – Winston Hubert McIntosh better known as Peter Tosh/Stepping Razor was a Jamaican guitarist and singer in the original Wailers of Bob Marley & the Wailers fame.  Born in Petersfield on October 19th 1944, he became a pioneer reggae musician, as the original guitarist for The Wailers and he is actaully considered as one of the originators of the choppy, syncopated reggae guitar style, and as trailblazer for the Rastafari movement and the fight to legalize cannabis.

He was a target for the police and underwent many beatings. In the early 60s Winston met Bob Marley and Bunny Wailer through his vocal teacher, Joe Higgs. Continue reading Peter Tosh 9/1987

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Brian Keenan 10/1985

Brian Keenan (42) – drummer for The Chamber Brothers – was born on January 28th 1943 in New York City.
As a child, he also lived in Conisbrough, Yorkshire, UK, and in Ireland. In the early 60s he did a short stint with pre-Do Wah Diddy Manfred Mann.
Back in the USA, prior to joining The Chambers Brothers, Keenan was a member of the Ondine night club house band, The Losers which was formed around 1965. Later in 1965, Brian joined The Chambers Brothers, a psychedelic soul-music group, soon after they got their big break when they appeared at the Newport Folk Festival, after which they recorded their debut album People Get Ready.

Keenan and Joe Chambers co-composed the 7:26 long song “A New Time – A New Day”, which appeared on the 1968 album, of the same name. He also co-composed “Do Your Thing” which was on the flip side to “I Can’t Turn You Loose”.
Bill Graham, the impresario behind the Fillmore West and the Fillmore East, felt that Brian was an exciting live rock drummer. The few times the Chambers Brothers were not top-billed with Brian on drums, the top-billed group was reluctant to follow them because they were intimidated by the Chambers Brothers with Keenan on drums.

The band scored their first major hit in 1968 with the well noted 11-minute long anthem “Time Has Come Today”, which was also included in the colorful underground compilation album “That’s Underground”.

The Brothers affectionately referred to Brian as Curley and introduced him onstage as Brian “Chambers” Keenan. The Chambers Brothers predated Sly and the Family Stone as harbingers of psychedelic soul. Keenan also wrote one of its early songs, “Love Me Like the Rain,” which appeared on the Shout album.
Keenan left the group in 1971 after major financial abuses by the group’s management went unresolved.

According to the 5 February 1972 issue of Billboard, Brian Keenan then became one of Genya Ravan’s (10 Wheel Drive) backing musicians. Ravan had shared billing with Jimmy Spears at the Bitter End in New York, but Ravan had moved away from her driving hard rock style to a blues-soul-pop style that had similarities with Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin.
Later Brian went on to start up his own recording studio in Connecticut

Brian Keenan sadly died of a fatal heart attack on October 5, 1985.  He was 42.

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Micki Harris 6/1982

addie_micki_harrisJune 11, 1982 – Addie “Micki” Harris was born Addie Harris McPherson on January 22, 1940 in Passaic, New Jersey.  As a founding member of The Shirelles, which originally formed in 1958 in Passaic, New Jersey by Shirley Owens, Alston Reeves, Doris Coley, Kenner Jackson and Beverly Lee, they became a sensation in early doo-wop.

The Shirelles were originally formed in 1957 in Passaic, NJ, by four either 16 or 17 years old high school friends: Doris Cole

 

y (later Doris Kenner-Jackson), Addie “Micki” Harris, Shirley Owens (later Shirley Alston), and Beverly Lee. 

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Elvis Presley 8/1977

elvisAugust 16, 1977 – Elvis Aaron Presley, more commonly known as “The King of Rock and Roll,”  is arguably the single most important figure in the global spreading of American 20th century popular music. Besides pop and rock ‘n roll, he brought the blues, black music and gospel to the world. Born in Tupelo, Mississippi on January 8, 1935, he made his first public performance on October 3rd 1945, in a singing contest at the Mississippi-Alabama Fair and Dairy Show, dressed as a cowboy. Elvis had to stand on a chair to reach the microphone and sang Red Foley’s “Old Shep.” He came in fifth, winning $5 and a free ticket to all the Fair rides.

He began his career as one of the first performers of rockabilly, an uptempo fusion of country and R&B with a strong back beat. Continue reading Elvis Presley 8/1977

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Freddie King 12/1976

Freddie KingDecember 29, 1976 – Freddie King was born September 3, 1934 in Gilmer, Texas. His mother told him that her father (who was a full-blooded Choctaw Indian) prophesied to her that she would have a child that will stir the souls of millions and inspire and influence generations. So she mother and his uncle Leon began teaching him to play guitar at the age of six.

His first guitar was a Silvertone acoustic. His most prized guitar at that time was his Roy Roger acoustic. In a interview years later he recalled going to the general store to order it. The store owner asked him if his mother knew he was trying to order a guitar on her store account. Freddie replied ” no”. The store owner told him to get permission. His mother said “no”. She told him, “if you want a new guitar you will have to work for it.” He stated that he picked cotton just long enough to earn the money to purchase a Roger’s guitar. Continue reading Freddie King 12/1976