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SKULLY WIKI
aka
Mark Riordan
bringing your music trivia facts from around the world
It wasnt hard to choose the subject for this months magazine in fact its going to be a triple Skully Wiki this month.
On 11th January I was shocked to hear the news of the passing Rock Legend....David Bowie.
When I was in my teens, his albums "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars" and the songs "Starman" and "Suffragette City" were part of my everyday teenage life!
My wife recalls that "The Jean Jeanie" from his album "Aladdin Sane", was the very first song we ever danced too at our high school dance!
Although not a big fan back in those days, as I grew older I began to appreciate the talents of this great musician. I have several Bowie albums in my vinyl collection.
Coincidently, 6 days later a drummer from a band that Bowie helped "launch" died from Alzheimers. That band was Mott The Hoople and the drummer was Dale Griffin. Bowie liked their "sound" and offered them his songs "Suffragette City" and "All The Young Dudes". Ian Hunter ,the lead singer wasn't too keen on Suffragette City but agreed to record All The Young Dudes,the rest as they say is history with Bowie mixing and producing the album.
Bowie also helped co- produce and mix Lou Reeds classic album Transformer along with his long time guitarist Mick Ronson who late rfunnily enough joined Mott The hoople for a while after Ian Hunter left the band.
As I said, earlier in my early teens I wasn't a keen fan of Bowie, but saying that one album really struck me and that was the aforementioned "Ziggy Stardust" and the track "Five Years" in my opinion is one of his finest songs.
I learned to appreciate his talent but it took me almost 10 years!
Three days later on 14th January I wake up to the news that one of Britains most talented actors Alan Rickman had passed away of Cancer. I have seen him in some brilliant movies.
I hated him in "Die Hard" and was pleased to see him thrown from the top floor of the building...oops spoiler alert for those that might not have seen it!
In "Robin Hood King of Thieves" although he played another villian, you couldn't help but like him!
In one of my favourite movies "Love Actually" he played a completely different role and showed a gentler side of his nature. Rickman appealed to a younger audience by appearing in all the "Harry Potter Movies" as Professor Severus Snape! Featuring in over 60 movies, he will be a great loss to the film industry!
Four days later, we lost another legend! Eagles front man Glen Frey was pronounced dead from complications due to rheumatoid arthritis.
Frey along with Don Henley, wrote most of the classic Eagles songs that we still hear on the radio today. Classics like "Hotel California", "Tequila Sunrise", "Take it Easy" "Desperado", the list goes on!
What household does not have "The Eagles Greatest Hits" amongst their music collection! This album is one of the greatest selling compilation albums of all time, selling over 42 million albums!
This month we lost three legends. Three legends that touched someone in some way! They will be sorely missed!