Reaper Fusion
by Wrongtom
I’ve been told I have an unhealthy preoccupation with death, ever-ready to post tributes to another fallen musician or actor across Twitter, Instagram etc. Some might sneer as if it’s some kind of morbid sycophancy, but I was inadvertently raised to honour the dead, and perhaps even keep them alive.
August 16th 1970. My sister Justine passed away in my dad’s arms after a long battle with cancer. She was three and a half. I was born five years later into a family struggling on in the shadow of death.
This might sound a little dramatic but I knew of death before I really understood what it was. A word which my mum alluded to throughout my childhood, perhaps in a search for catharsis. An unspoken word which shrouded my stoic father and fractured my sister, my late sister’s big sister. My brother and I were shown cine footage from the 60s. My mum would tell me stories, describing her idiosyncrasies or a funny turn of phrase which sounded far beyond her years. She lived on in my head. She still does, regularly reminding me of why I’m here, and of my own mortality.
We’re all now living in the shadow of the reaper. His hand on our shoulder as we queue behind gaffa-taped lines in Tesco. In the daily roll-out of Covid death stats, or the claps for our carers every Thursday which might bring some of us closer together for a brief moment but feel mostly benign as our NHS sit on the frontline like a poorly equipped Operation Human Shield.
In the arts we’ve watched in horror as this wretched pox continues to take some of our most beloved icons. It’s been a particularly busy few weeks for my fellow death reporters.
March 24th, on the first day of lockdown, afro-rock legend Manu Dibango fell foul to the disease. Tributes poured in. ‘Soul Makossa’ probably received more plays on the radio than it had since the 70s. A confusingly upbeat theme tune as we battened the hatches and hunkered down, chanting “mumma ko, mumma sa, maka makoosa” like an absurd rite in the face of an invisible enemy.
I’d never really considered these were actual words but it was written in the Cameroonian dialect Duala and roughly translates, or so I’m told, as “my mum is my mum, at the moment”. I thought about this as I drove some essentials to my mum’s house, fearful that the dreaded lurgy had hitched a ride on a pack of chocolate jaffa cakes or some toilet paper.
So many have passed since then. Some of Covid, others of natural causes or nasty ailments they’d been wrestling for a while already. Each one hurts. Sometimes there’s more than one in a day, and it sucks knowing they may have died in isolation, or that most friends and family won’t make it to their funerals.
A few days back we lost Little Richard. It was bone cancer, but amidst the daily death toll, the loss of rock n roll’s architect still hit hard. Far from an unsung hero, he received love across the board from Jagger to John Waters, the latter citing Richard as “the first punk, the first everything”.
You’d think Waters’ love may have faltered over the years following a fraught interview in 1987 which the filmmaker later wrote about in The Guardian, not to mention Richard’s to-ing and fro-ing in and out of the closet throughout his life, claiming he’d always been gay one minute, then stating it’s an “unnatural affection” the next.
One overlooked Little Richard moment happened in Paul Mazurky’s Down & Out In Beverly Hills. Based loosely on René Fauchois’ 1919 play Boudu Sauvé Des Eaux, the plot is transported to mid 80s Hollywood, and features Nick Nolte as the tramp saved from drowning by Richard Dreyfuss’ poor little rich man, struggling in the face of some of life’s worst first world problems. His character’s name? Dave Whiteman.
Richard plays Whiteman’s exasperated neighbour Otis Goodnight (essentially himself) and shines during a rant about institutional racism and the glass ceiling of black success, as Whiteman’s dog Matisse sets off the house alarm, prompting the police to show up in force to his rescue. (I’d skip to 1m 30s in the clip below assuming you don’t want to watch a sweaty Dreyfuss having sex with Elizabeth Peña).
Between messrs Manu and Little, it’s been a non-stop roll call of our heroes and role models. Actor Allen Garfield, comic artist and Jadorworsky collaborator Juan Giménez, and jazz pianist Ellis Marsalis Jr all succumbed to Covid, whilst we lost drummer Tony Allen to an aneurysm, Nobuhiko Obayashi — director of the deranged Hausu — to lung cancer, and veteran actor Jill Gascoine to Alzheimer’s. The list goes on and on. I’m a little broken thinking about it all again.
When Florian Schneider’s death (from cancer) was confirmed on May 6th, it sent social media into a spin. It’s by no means hyperbole to say that the Kraftwerk founder changed the face of music, from pioneering synthesized performance, to the birth of electro, hip hop, techno, house and every other sub-genre of electronic music which followed.
Elsewhere, less fuss was made about record exec and hip hop pioneer Andre Harrell aka Dr Jeckyll. Whilst most of his success story happened behind the scenes, it’s worth noting his role in bringing hip hop and modern RnB into the mainstream with his hand in tracks like Heavy D’s ‘Mr Big Stuff’, Al B Sure’s ‘If I’m Not Your Lover’ and Ultramagnetic MC’s groundbreaking debut LP Critical Beatdown.
There was one death which hit harder than the rest though. One much closer to home. In fact I was on my way home from a supplies-run to my mum’s when I heard the awful news. On May 7th, UK rapper Ty died from pneumonia as a result of contracting Covid-19.
I’d been keeping my eye on the news, having heard he was in intensive care in April, but word had it he was on the mend. Calling us friends might be an overstatement but he was my colleague and I liked him a lot, though he was a bit of a grump sometimes and I was never sure if it was mutual. Regardless I’d been a fan since I first saw him at Subterranea in the mid 90s, and since then we’d been label mates, first when I worked on Duppy Writer for Big Dada and later when we both signed to Tru Thoughts.
In 2013 at a Tru Thoughts birthday session at Koko in Camden, we were chatting over a cuppa in the green room before the show. I prefer not to blow smoke up fellow artist’s arses but it seemed appropriate to tell him how much his song ‘Hercules’ meant to me and I’m glad I did now. A genre-defying track about his school bully, the titular Hercules, played out over a sparse jazz backing of double bass and electric piano, almost beatless, save for a few finger snaps. Most labels might balk at this appearing on a rapper’s debut but fortunately Ty picked Big Dada who nurtured the oblique side of UK hip hop with the likes of Roots Manuva, New Flesh and Infinite Livez, though even amongst his label-mates Ty was an anomaly.
Former Big Dada label boss Will Ashon shared a great memory on Twitter, describing the scene at the 2004 Mercury Awards for which Ty’s 2nd LP Upwards was nominated. Fellow nominee Robert Wyatt had chosen Upwards as the pick of the bunch and Will introduced him and Ty after dinner. “He crouched down to chat while I stood uncomfortably next to Brian Eno. When he stood up he was glowing. That’s how I want to remember Ty… just a kid, really, who LOVED music with a passion and wanted to add to it and expand it.”
I’m reminded of the episode of Romesh Ranganathan’s Hip Hop Saved My Life podcast in which Ty discussed his broad tastes in music, which went from digging for samples to falling for the likes of Jethro Tull, Todd Rundgren and Yes. Some records he kept strictly for listening such as “two Colin Blunstone albums that I love to death but i won’t sample them, so they’re literally like washing up music, hoover music”.
Ty was rooted in hip hop, having been bitten by the bug at school when his mate recited lines from Heavy D’s ‘Mr Big Stuff’ but he wasn’t afraid to push the limits of the genre. I love how he crossed his T’s and dotted his I’s, opting for clear and eloquent verses, unafraid of embracing rap as poetry, yet he could still flex with the best of them. Check his recent project King Dem alongside legends Rodney P and Black Twang if you don’t believe me, not forgetting his verse on Seanie T’s ‘Veterans’ where Ty steps up between 19 fellow UK MCs including Ragga Twins, Roots Manuva and Navigator with his opening gambit “born in 1972-plus, Chaka Khan and Rufus…”
He was only 47. Only a few years my senior. The outpourings and memories from friends and fans proved he was much loved, but I still feel like he didn’t get his dues. I’ve watched him struggle through an unkind industry, even play to unkind audiences. I could see it took its toll at times but he kept at it, and it hurts to think he probably never realised how much he meant to us.
My lasting memory of Ty is from backstage at Love Supreme festival in 2015. We were getting ready for a Tru Thoughts takeover following Omar who was tearing the tent apart with his encore. I spotted Ty lingering near the side of the stage, a copy of Omar’s debut LP in his hand. He shamelessly accosted the singer as he stepped off stage, angling for an autograph, which Omar kindly obliged. The singer probably seemed like royalty to Ty. Two years later Omar’s 8th LP Love In Beats hit the shops. I picked it up, as I’ve done with all his albums, and low and behold, there was Ty on the opening track ‘Vicky’s Tune’.
He leaves behind a flourishing body of work which sadly didn’t quite bring him the success he deserved. We have to keep listening to it. Keep talking about it, and him, and everyone else. Keep in mind all these people that died during this pandemic, and not just the ones with Wiki pages. As I write, there have been 33,614 confirmed Covid-19 deaths in the UK alone, and it’s arguably closer to 50,000, and counting. The good news is my mum’s still with us, at the moment.
