Gil Scott-Heron Dead at 62

Perknose

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http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/29/arts/music/gil-scott-heron-voice-of-black-culture-dies-at-62.html?_r=1&hpw

Unique, and one of music's pioneers. I saw him live a couple of times in the 70's.

Gil Scott-Heron, the poet and recording artist whose syncopated spoken style and mordant critiques of politics, racism and mass media in pieces like “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” made him a notable voice of black protest culture in the 1970s and an important early influence on hip-hop, died on Friday at a hospital in Manhattan. He was 62 and had been a longtime resident of Harlem.

Videos
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (YouTube)
Whitey on the Moon (YouTube)

His death was announced in a Twitter message on Friday night by his British publisher, Jamie Byng, and confirmed early Saturday by an American representative of his record label, XL. The cause was not immediately known, although The Associated Press reported that he was admitted to St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center after becoming ill upon his return from a trip to Europe.

Mr. Scott-Heron often bristled at the suggestion that his work had prefigured rap. “I don’t know if I can take the blame for it,” he said in an interview last year with the music Web site The Daily Swarm. He preferred to call himself a “bluesologist,” drawing on the traditions of blues, jazz and Harlem renaissance poetics.

Yet, along with the work of the Last Poets, a group of black nationalist performance poets who emerged alongside him in the late 1960s and early ’70s, Mr. Scott-Heron established much of the attitude and stylistic vocabulary that would characterize the socially conscious work of early rap groups like Public Enemy and Boogie Down Productions and has remained part of the DNA of hip-hop by being sampled by stars like Kanye West.

“You can go into Ginsberg and the Beat poets and Dylan, but Gil Scott-Heron is the manifestation of the modern word,” Chuck D, the leader of Public Enemy, told The New Yorker in 2010. “He and the Last Poets set the stage for everyone else.”
 

Zebo

Elite Member
Jul 29, 2001
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What sad news, even sadder a lot what he hoped for took a step back. Maybe two.
 

SphinxnihpS

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Feb 17, 2005
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I must have been in a hole yesterday. WOW! FUCK! What a sad day...

Quebert, that is something we can agree on.
 

Perknose

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bad that ive never heard of him?

Not unless you vote or plan to breed. ;) j/k

But I'm not joking when I ask why, instead of posting what you did, you didn't take this opportunity to expand your musical horizons? <shrug>
 

Bignate603

Lifer
Sep 5, 2000
13,897
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They're announcing deaths of important people by twitter now? Seriously, show the guy some respect and do it through some real news outlets.
 

QueBert

Lifer
Jan 6, 2002
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They're announcing deaths of important people by twitter now? Seriously, show the guy some respect and do it through some real news outlets.

Sadly the "real news outlets" might run a 20 second story on this, which imho is no better than announcing it on Twitter. This man deserves an entire special dedicated to his life, if Bob Dylan died there would be be Bob Dylan weekend on VH1 and CNN would have an hour long show devoted to his memory. Gill's not "important" enough for this kind of treatment.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
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That's too bad. I liked his sound, and his poetry is in line with what I like to hear. Like Langston Hughes on a mellow groove.
 

CallMeJoe

Diamond Member
Jul 30, 2004
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I thought of Gil Scott-Heron when the story broke about the no-knock killing in Pima County.
 

alkemyst

No Lifer
Feb 13, 2001
83,769
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Why try heroin at 62? I don't get it.

kidding aside I hope at least this event gets some people to go check out his work and some be like "fuck, I know that."
 

alkemyst

No Lifer
Feb 13, 2001
83,769
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Sadly the "real news outlets" might run a 20 second story on this, which imho is no better than announcing it on Twitter. This man deserves an entire special dedicated to his life, if Bob Dylan died there would be be Bob Dylan weekend on VH1 and CNN would have an hour long show devoted to his memory. Gill's not "important" enough for this kind of treatment.

Well, you can't say important in this things. Michael Jackson I think proved it's not just a white/black deal in music anymore. Tupac and Biggie as well, Marvin Gaye.

This dude was a flash in the pan, a big bang, the catalyst to many even outside his race to start thinking.
 

QueBert

Lifer
Jan 6, 2002
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A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face and arms began to swell.
(and Whitey's on the moon)
I can't pay no doctor bill.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
Ten years from now I'll be payin' still.
(while Whitey's on the moon)
The man jus' upped my rent las' night.
('cause Whitey's on the moon)
No hot water, no toilets, no lights.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
I wonder why he's uppi' me?
('cause Whitey's on the moon?)
I wuz already payin' 'im fifty a week.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Taxes takin' my whole damn check,
Junkies makin' me a nervous wreck,
The price of food is goin' up,
An' as if all that shit wuzn't enough:
A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face an' arm began to swell.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
Was all that money I made las' year
(for Whitey on the moon?)
How come there ain't no money here?
(Hmm! Whitey's on the moon)
Y'know I jus' 'bout had my fill
(of Whitey on the moon)
I think I'll sen' these doctor bills,
Airmail special
(to Whitey on the moon)
 

HeavyD

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Jul 2, 2007
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He wasn't liked by the mainstream media and let's face it, the establishment doesn't like people who tell it like it is without sugar coating it.
 

QueBert

Lifer
Jan 6, 2002
22,757
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wow, is this going to turn into Whitey's are bad?

Well the bulk of his work and what he did with the Last Poets is what you'd probably view as "whitey's bad" But the poem/song I quoted isn't really saying that at all, it's a lot deeper.
 

Perknose

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Oct 9, 1999
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Why try heroin at 62? I don't get it.

kidding aside I hope at least this event gets some people to go check out his work and some be like "fuck, I know that."

Well, you can't say important in this things. Michael Jackson I think proved it's not just a white/black deal in music anymore. Tupac and Biggie as well, Marvin Gaye.

This dude was a flash in the pan, a big bang, the catalyst to many even outside his race to start thinking.

wow, is this going to turn into Whitey's are bad?

Alky, would you PLEASE STFU and stay out of this thread?

Your clumsy, clueless ignorance is really annoying.

First off, he didn't die of heroin, that was a passing joke that went over your head. Secondly, NO ONE is making this a white vs black thread except you, so, again, shut the fuck up.

Lastly, just because you're clueless and ignorant about his ground breaking music doesn't mean Gil Scott-Heron was a flash in the pan. You bringing those other artists into this convo out of left fucking field is so hopelessly dumb and beside any legitimate point its just annoying.

The guy just died. He was unique, a true artist.

Those of us who knew and enjoyed his music and who KNOW the irreplaceable debt that a whole swath of successors owe him are in this thread mourning his death and extending hm his well deserved artistic due even as we give him our posthumous thanks.

You're coming across like some idiot drunk who barges into a funeral home during a funeral service for someone you never even knew and starts a series of loud, disruptive, and pointless arguments.

Show some fucking respect.

PLEASE DON'T POST AGAIN HERE.
 

effowe

Diamond Member
Nov 1, 2004
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RIP, I just started getting into him through a remix of his new album by Jamie XX.