The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars (131 page)

As Stiv Bators (he added the ‘s’ early in his career), the singer had reportedly given Iggy the infamous jar of peanut butter with which the protopunkster smeared himself and made projectiles at a televized Stooges gig in 1970 – but Bators was very much a garage icon in the making himself. In 1975, he hung out with the lately touted Rockets (originally Rocket from the Tombs), the band that had housed Pere Ubu’s David Thomas and the late Peter Laughner (
June 1977).
But Bators’s own ‘great’ band was to be The Dead Boys (aka Frankenstein), a sneering collective of oddballs formed after Bators (briefly ‘Steve Machine’) was sent packing from The Rockets, supposedly for his bizarre vocal delivery. The Dead Boys – Bators, Cheetah Chrome (ex-Rockets, guitar), Jimmy Zero (guitar), Jeff Magnum (bass) and Johnny Blitz (ex-Rockets, drums) – befriended their natural brothers The Ramones, who helped not only to place them at CBGB’s but also to put out a couple of albums on the Sire label. The sophomore
We Have Come for Your Children
(1978) contained at least one punk classic in the minor hit ‘Sonic Reducer’. However, it was their stage act that gained The Dead Boys notoriety. A skinny, emaciated specimen, Bators nonetheless possessed one of the largest penises in rock – an asset he was keen to display once in a while. Thus, live performances resulted in trouble – anti-punk gangs usually attempted to start fights with the band – which all in all gave The Dead Boys a rather brief shelflife. On one occasion, Blitz almost died after being knifed in a post-concert fight, which resulted in the group’s 1979 end.

After a move to the UK, a stint in a one-album band called The Wanderers and a bit part in the John Waters movie
Polyester,
Stiv Bators returned in style with Lords Of The New Church in 1981, the most commercially viable of any of his projects. The Lords – Bators, Brian James (ex-Damned, guitar), Dave Treganna (ex-Wanderers, bass) and Nick Turner (drums) – produced three strong albums, pulling in MTV interest and a goth/stadium-rock audience, though the punk theatrics were still very much a part of the performance. At one remarkable 1983 show, Bators set about his long-favoured onstage practice of throttling himself with a microphone cord – but his typically eager fans decided to join in, tightening the ligature around their waif-like hero’s neck. As Bators began to turn blue, roadies pulled him backstage: in hospital, he was pronounced dead for two minutes, trumping pretty much all of
The Encyclopedia’s
Close … Closer! entrants. Returning from the other side, Bators’s main emotion was disappointment that he couldn’t recall how it felt to have snuffed it. How he felt when the moment
did
arrive is, of course, open to conjecture – but it was, perhaps unsurprisingly, just a matter of years before that eventuality. Bators was eventually sacked by Lords of the New Church (reportedly discovering his dismissal by reading a small ad for a new singer, which he then replicated on a T-shirt for his last performance), briefly returning to ignored solo work. Moving to Paris in 1988, Bator (once more ‘s’-less) attempted Dead Boys reunions, a supergroup with members of The New York Dolls and even a Lords reformation – but the moment had passed for this unique performer, now very much yesterday’s man.

‘I once died on stage. I mean, how do you top
that,
for Christ’s sake?’

Stiv Bator - just before doing so for real

On a Monday afternoon in June 1990, Stiv Bator was sitting on his motorbike at the kerb when a car sideswiped him, knocking him to the ground. Years of self-inflicted harm (and a few beatings) had left him immune to pain, so the singer merely walked back to his apartment and put himself to bed. This time, there was no second chance: the injuries were more serious than he realized, and Bator died from a blood clot as he slept. His ashes were dusted over the grave of another erstwhile Paris resident, Jim Morrison.

See also
Philip ‘Taylor’ Kramer (
February 1995)

Tuesday 5

Richard Sohl

(New York City, 26 May 1953)

The Patti Smith Group

In a bad week for US protopunk, keyboardist Richard Sohl – for many years faithful sidekick to New York art-rocker Patti Smith – also passed away. Sohl had joined the singer and her guitarist, Lenny Kaye, in 1973, beginning a relationship with Smith and her innovative fusion of radical Dylanesque poetry and rock ‘n’ roll power that lasted well into the next decade.

The Patti Smith Group were one of the star attractions at New York’s CBGB’s, quickly signing to the MER label for their first single, 1974’s hard-bitten ‘Piss Factory’. A stunning album,
Horses
(1975), was then issued by Arista – and remains, thirty years later, one of the finest rock debuts of all time. Though Smith had vision, Sohl’s input was also of supreme importance, so she was understandably disappointed when his persistent absenteeism saw him leave the group after the follow-up
Radio Ethiopia
(1976). Little was heard from the keyboardist as Patti Smith enjoyed her own commercial zenith towards the end of the decade, although he returned to her side for the solid comeback album
Dream Of Life
(1988). Richard Sohl died from heart complications – and not, as has been reported elsewhere, from either AIDS or a drug overdose. Four years later, Smith was to endure the deaths of her longtime partner, Fred ‘Sonic’ Smith of the MC5
(gNovember 1994),
and her brother, Todd – both also from heart problems.

Jimmy Hodder

(Boston, Massachusetts, 17 September 1947)

Steely Dan

(Linda Ronstadt)

(Bead Game)

That same afternoon, drummer Jimmy Hodder also met his maker: the man who had made his name with East Coast rock/jazz titans Steely Dan was to die tragically at a swimming party.

Hodder began his music career with the little-remembered Boston hippy combo Bead Game, before joining the band whose smooth sound belied the origins of their name (to jog the memory, ‘Steely Dan’ was a steam-powered dildo from William Burroughs’s cult novel
Naked Lunch).
Originally an accordion-player, Hodder took to the traps at the behest of The Dan’s producer Gary Katz, contributing to their acclaimed first two albums, the gold-selling debut
Can’t Buy a Thrill
(1972) and
Countdown To Ecstasy
(1973). With a pair of US hit singles, including the great ‘Do It Again’ (1972), the impact for the band – at this time centred around former Bard College buddies Donald Fagen (keyboards/vocals) and Walter Becker (bass/vocals), with Hodder, David Palmer (vocals), Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter (guitar) and Denny Dias (guitar) – was phenomenal, especially considering that they had been recruited purely for studio work. Hodder’s stay with Steely Dan did not last much longer: with the band’s main men increasingly reluctant to tour, he set off with Linda Ronstadt’s band just as the third Steely Dan album,
Pretzel Logic
(1974), took off. While Steely Dan became the studio affair originally intended, Hodder disappeared into session oblivion.

Found by friends floating in the pool of his home in Point Arena, California, Hodder was rushed to hospital, where he died shortly afterwards. Coroners discovered that his blood alcohol limit was three times the recommended level.

See also
Jeff Porcaro (
August 1992)

Saturday 23

Isaac Payton Sweat

(Port Arthur, Texas, 19 July 1944)

Johnny Winter’s Black Plague Band

(The Crystaliers/The Coastliners)

(Various acts)