Willy DeVille, who founded the punk group Mink DeVille and was known for his blend of R&B, blues, Dixieland and traditional French Cajun ballads, died Aug. 6. He was 58.

Mink DeVille, for which DeVille was the principal songwriter, was billed as one of the most original groups on the New York punk scene after an appearance at the CBGB club in Greenwich Village in the 1970s.

Better known in Europe than in the United States, DeVille went solo in 1980 with Le Chat Bleu. His “Storybook Love,” featured in the 1987 movie “The Princess Bride,” was nominated for an Academy Award.

Billy Lee Riley, a rambunctious performer who helped develop the Sun Records sound as a studio musician for other headliners, died Aug. 2 at the age of 75.

Riley’s singles included “Red Hot” and “Flyin’ Saucers Rock & Roll.” He was overshadowed by his cohorts at Sun Records, including Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis. Among many other songs, Riley and his band played on the original Sun recording of Lewis’ “Great Balls of Fire.”

Musician and producer Jim Dickinson died Aug. 15 at the age of 67.

Perhaps best known as the father of Luther and Cody Dickinson, two-thirds of the Grammy-nominated North Mississippi Allstars, Dickinson recorded the Rolling Stones’ “Wild Horses”; formed the Atlantic Records house band The Dixie Flyers to record with Aretha Franklin and other R&B legends; and played with Bob Dylan on his Grammy-winning Time Out of Mind.

Rashied Ali, a free-jazz drummer who backed John Coltrane and accompanied him in a duet album in the final months of the jazz master’s life, died Aug. 12 at age 76.

After Coltrane died, Ali toured Europe before returning to New York to play and record there. He opened the jazz club Ali’s Alley in 1973 and launched the Survival Records label, which he maintained until his death. The club closed in 1979.

Mike Seeger, who helped revive traditional American folk music, died Aug. 7 at age 75.

Two of his siblings were key figures in the folk-music revival of the 1950s and ’60s: his half brother, Pete, and sister Peggy.

Mike Seeger helped form the traditional music group The New Lost City Ramblers in 1958. He recorded more than 40 albums solo and with others, and received six Grammy Award nominations.

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press

Drake Levin, the youngest member of the ’60s pop group Paul Revere And The Raiders, died July 4 at the age of 62, losing a battle with cancer that began in the ’90s.

Paul Revere And The Raiders were the first rock group signed to Columbia Records. They released 23 consecutive hit singles from 1962 to 1974 and collected seven gold albums. Guitarist Drake joined the group in 1963 at 16 years of age, having to leave high school to go on the road with the Raiders. His last tour with the original group was April 1967, although a 30-year reunion concert of the four original Raiders came in 1997.

After leaving the Raiders in 1967, Drake, Phil “Fang” Volk and Mike Smith formed The Brotherhood and recorded three albums for RCA.

Hart McNee, the raspy-voiced bass flutist and baritone saxophonist and a longtime musical fixture in New Orleans, San Francisco and his native Chicago, died July 14. He was 66.

While attending the University of Wisconsin, McNee played sax with both Boz Scaggs and Steve Miller.

After military service, McNee moved to San Francisco, where he played with such bluesmen and revivalists as Otis Rush, John Lee Hooker and Michael Bloomfield.

In 1990, he moved to New Orleans, where he played with groups including the Naked Orchestra, Los Vecinos, the Storyville Stompers, Mas Mamones, Moyuba, Coco Robicheaux and John Boutte.

According to Lightning Strikes Music, 87-year-old Twyla Herbert, Lou Christie’s writing partner, has died.

The two met when Christie was 15 years old. Their partnership of 50 years produced, among other titles, the hit singles “The Gypsy Cried,” “Two Faces Have I,” “Trapeze,” “Rhapsody In The Rain” and “Lightning Strikes.”

Album-cover artist and designer Tom Wilkes died June 28 at the age of 69.

In 1967, Wilkes was the art director of the Monterey International Pop Festival. He created all graphics and printed materials for Monterey Pop, including the program book and the festival’s psychedelic and iconic foil poster.

He was the art director for A&M Records in the late ’60s and for ABC Records in the ’70s. Wilkes designed and directed such hit record covers as Rolling Stones’ Flowers and Beggars Banquet, Neil Young’s Harvest and George Harrison’s Concert for Bangladesh and All Things Must Pass.

He received a Grammy Award in 1974 for Best Recording Package for The Who’s rock opera Tommy, as performed by the London Symphony Orchestra & Choir.

Allen Klein, music-industry manager and founder of ABKCO Music & Records, died July 4 after a lengthy battle with Alzheimer’s. He was 77.

Klein was one of the most powerful figures in the music business in the 1960s but ended up feuding with some of his biggest clients. An accountant known for his brashness, temper and tenacity in tracking down royalties and getting better record deals, Klein’s clients included Sam Cooke, Bobby Darin and Herman’s Hermits.

But he became most famous for signing on The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. Klein represented The Beatles in renegotiations between Apple and EMI in 1969 which resulted in their being granted the highest royalty rate ever paid to an artist up to that time. Both arrangements eventually spurred lawsuits, with some Beatles fans blaming Klein for contributing to the tensions that broke up the group. Following the Beatles split, he continued to work with John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

In 2006, Klein was the recipient of the Abe Olman Publisher Award presented by the Songwriters Hall of Fame in recognition of his career-long leadership position in music publishing.

Michael Klenfner, a former Atlantic Records music executive who helped transform the Blues Brothers from a “Saturday Night Live” skit into Grammy Award-nominated recording artists, died July 14 at the age of 62.

In the 1970s, Klenfner helped comedians Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi take their “SNL” act about an American blues and soul revivalist band to the top of the charts.

Klenfner later helped steer Cher’s comeback with her 1998 hit “Believe.” He promoted hundreds of other musicians in a career spanning more than 30 years.

Denver radio personality Ray Durkee died June 28 at the age of 70. Durkee was best known for his syndicated show “Sunday at the Memories,” which played oldies music, old radio shows and even vintage commercials. Durkee began the show at KHOW in 1976; it was carried by 100 stations at its peak.

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press

Kenny Rankin, a pop vocalist and musician-songwriter whose 50-year music career ranged from jazz to pop, died June 7 of complications relating to lung cancer. He was 69.

Rankin, who began with a handful of singles for Decca Records in the late 1950s, first gained acclaim as one of the guitarists on Bob Dylan’s 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home. He wrote and recorded the pop standard “Peaceful” and also wrote “In The Name of Love,” which was recorded by Peggy Lee, and “Haven’t We Met,” performed by Carmen McRae and Mel Torme.

Huey Long, a jazz guitarist whose career included stints with musical giants Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker and as part of the Ink Spots vocal group, died June 10 at the age of 105.

Long joined Earl “Fatha” Hines, whose big band included Gillespie, Parker and Sarah Vaughn, in 1943. In 1945, Long was leading his own trio when vocalist Bill Kenny invited him to join the Ink Spots, whose velvet harmonies and flashy performing style had helped them become one of the first black groups to gain acceptance among white listeners.

The Ink Spots, whose recordings included such classics as “If I Didn’t Care” and “I’ll Get By,” along with songs “I Cover The Waterfront” and “Java Jive” later reinvented for newer generations, were inducted into the Grammy Hall Of Fame in 1987 and into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 1989. They are often credited with having a direct influence on the evolution of doo-wop groups and rhythm and blues.

Long went on to form his own combo and studied music in California. He also led a version of the Ink Spots in the 1960s.

Bob Bogle, who cofounded the Ventures with Don Wilson, died June 14 at the age of 75.

The Ventures scored their first hit in 1960 with their version of the song “Walk, Don’t Run.” It sparked a remarkable run that saw the Ventures chart with 38 albums from 1960 to 1972, selling more than 100 million records. Their hits included “Perfidia,” “Telstar/The Lonely Bull” and the theme from TV’s “Hawaii Five-O.”

Although Bogle hadn’t played live with the band in four years, he remained active in recording and producing. The Ventures were inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 2008 and celebrated the 50th anniversary of the group’s founding in April 2009.

According to an announcement made June 14 on Alice Cooper’s MySpace page, Cooper’s longtime archivist and personal assistant, Brian “Renfield” Nelson, has died. The announcement reads, in part “It was a sudden, completely unexpected, and untimely passing. We would appreciate it if you would keep him in your thoughts, appreciate his many contributions to Alice’s life and career over the years, and respect Brian’s privacy and the privacy of Alice and his extended family (at home and on tour) at this time. Alice is currently on tour in Russia, because the show must go on, which is as Brian would have wanted it.”

Sky Saxon, lead singer and founder of the 1960s band The Seeds, died June 25 after a brief illness. Saxon was in his 60s, but described his age as “eternal.”

The Seeds sprang up in California, and their garage-band sound became a favorite of the flower-power generation. They had two hit singles in 1967 with “Pushin’ Too Hard” and “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine” and their song “Mr. Farmer” was included in the soundtrack for the movie “Almost Famous.”

Saxon had recently moved to Austin, where he played with his new band, Shapes Have Fangs. He had been planning to perform this summer with the California ’66 Revue, a tour featuring a lineup of California bands from the 1960s.

Harve Presnell, whose booming baritone graced such Broadway musicals as “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” and “Annie,” died of cancer June 30 at the age of 75.

An operatic singer, Presnell was cast alongside Liberace and the British rock group Herman’s Hermits in 1965’s “When the Boys Meet the Girls” and with Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood in “Paint Your Wagon” in 1969.

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press

Alan W. Livingston, the music-industry executive who signed The Beatles and Frank Sinatra during his tenure at Capitol Records, died March 13 at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif. He was 91.

Livingston, who also created the popular Bozo the Clown character, became an executive at Capitol in the early 1950s. He signed Frank Sinatra at a low point in his career and introduced him to arranger Nelson Riddle. The pair produced “I’ve Got The World On A String” and “Young At Heart,” leading to Sinatra’s comeback on the charts.

As Capitol’s president, Livingston signed The Beach Boys, Steve Miller and The Band in the ’60s. Capitol, then partly owned by The Beatles’ UK record company, EMI, had rejected the group’s early hit singles as unsuitable for the American market. When Livingston heard “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” he agreed to release it and brought the Fab Four to the U.S in 1964 to promote it.

Jimmy Boyd, the child vocalist and actor best known for singing the original rendition of the Christmas novelty hit “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” in 1952, died of cancer March 7 in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 70.

“I Saw Mommy” shot to the top of the Billboard charts three weeks after it was released. It sold 2 million records in less than 10 weeks. Boyd, who was 13 when he recorded the song, told Time magazine soon after its release that he was surprised by its success. “I like it personally,” he said, “but I didn’t think anyone would buy it.”

James Odell Johnson Sr., bass singer with the 1950s rhythm-and-blues vocal group the Whispers, died Jan. 1 in Baltimore after a lengthy illness.  He was 73.  Johnson and his roommate Bill Mills, Eugene “Lump” Lewis, Billy Thompson, and Thompson’s Douglass High classmate Isaiah “Terry” Johnson (no relation) formed the original group, then known as Terry Johnson and the Rhythm Kings, in early 1954.

Willie King, 65, an Alabama blues singer and guitarist whose career took him to the largest blues festivals in North America and Europe, died of a heart attack March 8.

King was named Blues Artist of the Year by Living Blues Magazine in 2004. He also appeared in the Martin Scorsese film “Feel Like Going Home.”

John Cephas, a blues guitarist and singer with the duo Cephas & Wiggins, died of natural causes March 4 at his home in Bowling Green, Ky. He was 78.

Cephas & Wiggins’ first U.S. album, Dog Days Of August, from 1987, won a Blues Music Award for Best Traditional Blues Album of the Year.

Country singer and Grand Ole Opry member Hank Locklin died March 8 at his home in Brewton, Ala. He was 91.

Locklin’s hits included “Send Me the Pillow You Dream On” and “Please Help Me I’m Falling.” He recently released his 65th album, “By the Grace of God.” He became an Opry member in 1960.

Grand Ole Opry singer Ernie Ashworth, who had a No. 1 hit in 1963 with “Talk Back Trembling Lips,” died March 2 in Hartsville, Tenn., after a sudden illness. He was 80.

Ashworth began his career writing songs for Little Jimmy Dickens, Carl Smith, Johnny Horton and pop idol Paul Anka. He joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1964.

Irby Mandrell, Barbara Mandrell’s father and longtime manager, died in a Nashville, Tenn., hospital at age 84. A spokeswoman for the country star said the elder Mandrell died March 5 at Baptist Hospital after a brief stay.

Altovise Joanne Gore Davis, a dancer and actress and the widow of Sammy Davis Jr., died March 14 in Los Angeles after suffering a stroke. She was 65.

After Sammy Davis’ death in 1990, she was left to sort through his multimillion IRS tax debt and oversee his troubled estate. Last year, she sued two former business partners in federal court, claiming they tricked her into signing away the rights to the estate. The suit is pending.

Avid record collector Eddie Hoover died Feb. 4 in California. He was 66. Hoover was a longshoreman for 35 years and a longtime rock ’n’ roll music fan.

Doug Hanners of the Austin Record Convention recalled, “Eddie never had the aggressive ‘killer’ instinct that typifies most longtime collectors. He had a easygoing attitude and a ready smile for most situations … Eddie attended all the record shows up and down the length of California and started coming to the big Austin, Texas, show in the early ’80s.” Hanners said Hoover continued to attend the Austin show even after becoming wheelchair-bound due to complications from diabetes. “Eddie was a dedicated collector and a true friend, we’ll all miss him,” Hanners said.

Radio station WVON-AM says Chicago DJ Richard Pegue, known as “Doctor Dusty” for his sets of classic R&B, died March 3 of heart failure. He was 64.

by  Goldmine Staff and The Associated Press