obituary

, the Godfather of Soul and the Hardest Working Man in Show Business, died early this morning in Atlanta, Georgia, the Associated Press reports. He was 73 years old. Brown was hospitalized yesterday for pneumonia, though his agent told the AP that it was unclear at this time what, exactly, was the cause of death.

The Reverend Jesse Jackson, Brown s longtime friend, told the Associated Press, He was dramatic to the end-- dying on Christmas Day. Almost a dramatic, poetic moment. He ll be all over the news all over the world today.

He would have it no other way. One of the most influential figures in rock n roll history, James Brown helped invent the soul, funk, modern r b, and hip-hop genres, with top 10 hits in four decades and an unparalleled live show. He kept performing until the very end, and was scheduled to play in New York City on New Year s Eve.

, founder of , died yesterday, December 14, in New York City. He was 83 years old. The legendary executive had been in a coma following an October 29 fall backstage at a Rolling Stones concert.

It was a fitting conclusion to a life that both was shaped by rock n roll and helped shape rock n roll. The son of the United States Ambassador to Turkey, Ertegun was born in Isanbul, Turkey in 1923 and spent his childhood traveling the world. He founded Atlantic at the age of 24 in 1947 with $10,000 borrowed from his family dentist.

Through the label, Ertegun would go on to cultivate the careers of stars in virtually every era of rock history. In the 1950s, Ertegun helped lay the groundwork for American soul and r b as we know it by signing such artists as Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, and Ray Charles. Concurrently, Atlantic also released seminal jazz records by the likes of John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, and Ornette Coleman.

In the 1960s, Ertegun and Atlantic virtually invented classic rock, putting out albums by Led Zeppelin, Yes, Buffalo Springfield, Cream, King Crimson, Crosby, Stills Nash, and Blind Faith. He signed the Rolling Stones in 1971 and Genesis in 1973. Atlantic was sold to the company that would go on to become Warner Communications in 1967.

It continues to be a powerhouse to this day, with artists ranging from Diddy, Lupe Fiasco, Death Cab for Cutie, and Bjork to Gnarls Barkley, Bloc Party, the Streets, and Missy Elliott.
The Athens, Georgia music community, as close-knit as scenes come, experienced a tragic loss this past Monday as Will Westbrook, guitarist for -affiliated offshoot , passed away.
Will was also an Olivia Tremor Control collaborator, a player in Neutral Milk Hotel s live incarnation, and a celebrated photographer-- it s his portrait of NMH that appears on the Elephant 6 .

Will s untimely death-- said to extend from unspecified recent health problems-- prompted an outpouring of grief from the Athens community.
Will was a a great guy, and a madman as a guitar player, wrote Ben Crum of fellow Orange Twin act on his band s . He will be sorely missed.

Along with Scott Spillane and John D Azzo, Westbrook formed the core of the Gerbils, who came together back in Louisiana in 1992, later relocating to Athens. They released a pair of albums and several singles over the years (also breaking up for a period), the most recent being 2001 LP The Battle of Electricity on Orange Twin.
Some thoughts posted by J.

Kirk Pleasant of former Athens band on the Elephant 6 touched on elements of Will s character unbeknownst to most. He was very unassuming on stage, wrote Pleasant. His beauty always lay in the very very subtle.

It took him forever to do anything...

record a guitar solo, line up a photo, make a cup of coffee. If anyone ever goes by the transmetropolitan in Athens, notice the tile before the entrance. Will did those tiles and took years (as I recall) to finish the job.

Every tile was perfect and he made sure that when he did anything, it was perfect.
He was an extraordinary photographer. I always admired him the most for that.

His hands were perpetually cracked and dry. I keep seeing his hands in my mind today as this news sinks in. This is tearing me apart.

I ll miss him.
Our hearts go out to friends and family of Will and all those he loved.
We are saddened to report that , former drummer for much-loved California trio , passed away yesterday from brain cancer.

He was 29.
Whitehurst co-founded the Velvet Teen with Little Tin Frog bandmate Judah Nagler around the turn of the century, and played on the band s early EPs and two full-lengths-- 2002 s Out of the Fierce Parade and 2004 s Elysium, both released via Portland imprint . Whitehurst exited the band after Elysium, and the Velvet Teen welcomed new drummer Casey Deitz for this year s Cum Laude.

Logan was an incredibly special and endlessly gifted person, wrote Slowdance Records owner Ezra Caraeff on the label website.
Possibly the most grounded and mature person I have ever met, Logan also had the pure joy of a child, always approaching life with a[n] inspiring sense of optimism, despite how downright unfair (my words, never his) things can become. I speak for everyone involved with this label, its bands and those associated with us, when I say that Logan will be missed terribly.

..If you ever were lucky enough to meet him, you ll know why I am saying these things.

Friends and fans expressed similar sentiments on the Velvet Teen s , as well as that of Whitehurst s solo project, .
Logan battled brain cancer for some time-- successfully it seemed-- until it returned in August of this year. According to my doctor and a recent brain-and-spine scan, I have had a hell of a recurrence of brain cancer, wrote Logan in a profoundly sad MySpace blog entry dated August 30, 2006.

My doctor is fairly well convinced that this will kill me within the year. Sucks to be me right now. I will do what I can to get the Very Tiny Songs album out on Pandacide Records, but it looks like it will honestly be my very last release.

Thank you all-- I love you for being there for me.
We offer our deepest condolences to family, friends, fans, and all whose lives were touched by Logan. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member, and Grammy- and Tony Award-winning r b singer died at a Las Vegas-area hospital on November 17 at the age of 78.

According to an Associated Press report, her death learned to sing in church while growing up in Portsmouth, Virginia, and she became famous in the 1950s, when her hits for Atlantic Records included Girl s Gone Rockin . She was also known as Miss Rhythm. she spent most of the 60s raising both of her sons and working outside of the music industry, Brown later went on to win a Tony Award for and Blue.

She also had a part in the 1988 movie Hairspray, and, in 1989, she won a Grammy for Best Female Jazz Vocal Performance for her album Blues was the aunt of legendary MC Rakim, and she remained active until the end of her life, specifically helping to found the On Thursday, November 9, groundbreaking feminist cultural critic Ellen Willis died of lung cancer at age 64, according to various reports. She died at home in Queens. Willis was one of the original New Journalists of the 1960s and 70s-- writers who told stories using conversational language and commonplace details.

Except for Joan Didion, Willis was pretty much the only woman in the crew, which also included such luminaries as Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Wolfe. But Willis did more than pioneer a style of writing; she was a pioneer herself.

She was one of the first female music critics, and was also the first popular music critic at The New Yorker. (Read what Sasha Frere-Jones, the magazine s current pop critic, wrote about her .) Willis also wrote for The Village Voice, The Nation, Slate, Salon, Rolling Stone, and Dissent, where she was on the editorial board.

After Willis left The New Yorker in 1975, she tussled with topics (religion, radicalism) that she d always touched on in her music writing but never directly addressed. She was one of the first feminists to oppose the anti-pornography movement, called out left-wing anti-Semites, and founded two protest groups, Redstockings and No More Nice Girls. Willis books include 1981 s Beginning to See the Light: Pieces of a Decade, 1992 s No More Nice Girls: Countercultural Essays, 1999 s Don t Think, Smile!

: Notes on a Decade of Denial. At the time of her death, Willis was a professor at New York University, and also the head of the school s Center for Cultural Reporting and Criticism, which she founded in 1995. She was also working on a book about radical psychoanalytic thought.

Pitchfork is greatly indebted to Willis and her work. We send our deepest condolences to her family. We re extremely saddened to report that Larissa Strickland, formerly of two esteemed acts-- Detroit-area blues-punk upstarts and early 1980s punk combo (not to be confused with later L.

A. grunge-punk act L7)-- has passed away, according to a by label head Corey Rusk on T G s website.
While there is no official word on the details, Larissa is rumored to have died on November 4 from a prescription medication overdose.

Larissa co-founded and sang for L-Seven from 1980-1983, under her given name, Larissa Stolarchuk. The band inspired many in the local scene and even opened once for another letter-number act, a young U2. After L-Seven parted ways, Larissa went on to shred guitar (with the surname Strickland) for Laughing Hyenas-- along with vocalist John Brannon (ex-Negative Approach), and former members of Rusk s old band, the Necros-- from 1985-1995.

L-Seven released an EP in 1982 through Touch and Go s Special Forces offshoot, while Laughing Hyenas graced us with several albums, an EP, and a 7 via the label over their ten-year career. Strickland also shared her love for punk with others through her fanzine, Anonymous.
Remembered Rusk, In the Laughing Hyenas, Larissa blazed her own trail and paved the way for the growing numbers of talented women in real rock bands in the 90s and 00s.

She had an undeniable vibrancy and energy that was all her own. I looked up to her and was honored to be her friend and to be involved with both of her bands. I will never forget her.

Carl Dobson, aka MC Crazy Titch, was sentenced to 30 years in prison yesterday for the murder of 21-year-old producer Richard Holmes in November of last year, according to a . Dobson (23) and his associate Anthony Green (35), who also received a life sentence, confronted Holmes over the lyrics to a song by Sabar Shah, aka Shak, a friend of Holmes. They were upset that Shah insulted Dobson s half-brother, Dwayne Mahorn, aka Durrty Goodz (an MC featured on the first Run the Road compilation).

The Shak lyrics in question: Over the years, things change in the hood. I used to have a lot of respect for Durrty Goodz-- Not no more. They were apparently unfazed by the fact that the lines do not exactly scan.

Shah refused to apologize for the lyrics on the day of the murder. According to the BBC, when Holmes then stood up for his friend, Dobson and Green approached him with a Mach-10 machine gun and shot him in the back and leg as he ran away. A teenage rap fan and witness of the shooting identified Dobson from having seen him on TV.

Durrty Goodz, meanwhile, was cleared of murder and manslaughter charges.
Jokes aside, we hope the families and friends of all involved are coping in the midst of this ridiculous and tragic situation.