Music May 17, 2012 at 9:30 am

Comments

1
Dear God, that ruined my day
2
she was terrific, and i loved her so.

here's "state of independence". it's awesome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPlNrP9B2…

3
Where's your fucking Carlos Fuentes obit?
4
Such a singular voice. She was playing the first time I tiptoed into the Ass Infection as a callow youth - so welcoming.
5
For the last 3 years, I managed to make her concerts in Casino Rama and Fallsview. Her concerts were full of energy and class. May she rest in peace
6
3: Fucking here.
7
I was dancing to her songs in the gay bars of Chicago. She was the Madonna of her day. RIP
8
@1 - mine to

Last Dance - my favorite
9
Love to Love you Baby is such a sexy song.
10
So, so won't be forgotten. RIP, Ms. Summer.
11
No women of color until minute three? And then they were dancers, not "real women"? I'll bet she would cast it different now -- I'll bet she COULD cast it different now.
12
I vote for On the Radio. I was hardly a fan, but that one really struck a chord with the younger me.
13
well now .. there was that time when she got 'ligion and went all 'adam and steve' on us.. but yeah.. state of independance.. i was ALL about that one.. i mean vamgelis and yes and and miss donna..how could i not resist..
diva down.. dag..
14
Went through college listening to her, danced to her (and still do), thanks and RIP, Donna.
15
Her songs were background music to the late '70's disco scene and I loved dancing to them all. I remember how disappointed I was when she made the fatal error of admonishing her gay fans to change their lifestyles to get right with God in the face of AIDS. Her career careened off the rails, gays made her and gays dropped her. She apologized but was snubbed for a while but who could stay mad with that voice? She was welcomed back whole-heartedly and will always be part of the disco canon.
16
My very first "grown up" 45 was Donna Summer's "On the Radio." My dad, God love him, heard Air Supply's version of "Pilot of the Airwaves" on the radio and decided it was harmless enough for me to listen to. The only problem was that he had now idea who the group was or what the song was called. So he went to the neighborhood record store (back when there was such a thing), and told them he wanted, "That radio song." So for my 9th or 10th birthday, I ended up with "On the Radio," which my dad didn't approve of nearly as much.
17
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I remember hearing her when I was a kid back in the seventies. I could take or leave her. Then somehow I "discovered" her music sometime in the last five years and was absolutely blown away. I was hoping to see her in concert sometime.

And damn, 63 really pretty young. :(
18
Some of the first records I ever bought were Donna Summer, and I still listen to her regularly. Such sad news to wake up to.
19
I love Donna Summer and mourn her passing, but the real loss for me today is Doug Dillard, banjo-picker extraordinaire, who had about seven different careers -- not just in The Dillards, whose "Wheatstraw Suite" is probably the best country-folk-rock album ever made, but in The Dillard's alter egos The Darlings, who enlivened a number of episodes of The Andy Griffith Show, and his spectacular collaboration with Gene Clark of The Byrds, which resulted in two albums that frankly blow away the country-rock efforts of both The Byrds and The Flying Burrito Brothers.

God knows how you made it to 75, Doug, with the way you treated your body, but we are all the richer for it.

Here's Dillard and Clark on their greatest song, "Why Not Your Baby". Gene Clark's magnificent plaintive vocal is the centerpiece, of course, but the interplay between the banjo and string orchestra is special and drives the song -- it's perhaps THE unnoticed masterpiece of the sixties, as good as anything The Byrds ever did: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TQ6PYS2Q…

Here's The Darlings ripping it to rags with Andy Griffith on guitar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnniyab94…

Now I'm going to go hide in the bathroom and cry for a minute. Rest easy, Doug.
20
Oh, here's an even better one: "Doug's Tune": http://youtu.be/xRsjszrf8xA
21
@ Fnarf, that's a lot of dead musicians lately. Chuck Brown was just yesterday, I believe - also 75.
22
@21, get used to it. A well-known musician is going to die pretty much every day for the next twenty years as the pop revolution comes to an end.
23

It's different now.

Back in my day, it seemed like the rock and pop stars we thought were cool and/or sexy were in their 30s while we were teens.

That's because I grew up in the 1970s...so you had the "matured" 60s rock guys (those still alive). Even many of the punk / new wavers were more sophisticated older...they had to know all that rock history to make fun of it. Debbie Harry...

But now it seems like things swung back to the teeny bopper style. Justin Bieber. Old man at 18.

So...it is now shocking to see these idols hitting the age where death and decay happens rapidly....and know that it's only ten years out.

Please wait...

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