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Mic Gillette (May 7, 1951 - January 17, 2016)

By Jim Harrington 01/18/2016 11:09:24 AM PST
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The Bay Area music community was reeling after news broke that Mic Gillette, a founding member of East Bay soul-R&B powerhouse Tower of Power, died unexpectedly over the weekend. He was 64.

"Today we are shocked, stunned, and saddened to learn that Mic Gillette has passed away," Tower of Power said on its Facebook page on Sunday. "We are told that a sudden heart attack took him. Please keep Mic's family in your thoughts and prayers during this most difficult time."

Gillette will be remembered as a key component of Tower of Power's legendary horn section -- which is routinely ranked among the greatest horn sections of the last 50 years. The acclaimed brass player, who performed on both trumpet and trombone, was prominently featured on the band's best-known recordings, including such hits as "You're Still a Young Man," "So Very Hard to Go" and "What Is Hip?"

"Mic was without a doubt the greatest brass player I've ever known," Tower of Power band leader Emilio Castillo said on the band's website. "Our sincere condolences go out to his wife Julia and his daughter Megan and their entire family."

He'll also be remembered as a man with strong ties to the community, having spent much time working with the music programs at local high schools and middle schools.

Greg Brown, instrumental music director at Northgate High School in Walnut Creek, says Gillette was "an over the top supporter of young musicians and music in the schools" and was "always full of life, enthusiasm and incredibly inspirational."

"I so appreciate knowing and working with him and having the privilege of hosting him as a guest artist with my students," Brown says. "He was hugely influential in the development of the trumpet lineage at Northgate High School and amongst countless young musicians.

Gillette had worked with the Tower of Power guys since the mid-'60s, although the Oakland band wouldn't take on that name until a few years later. Alongside saxophonists Castillo, Stephen "Doc" Kupka and Skip Mesquite, multi-instrumentalist Greg Adams and others, Gillette helped Tower of Power reach much success in the early '70s, with such classic soul-funk offerings as "Bump City" and "Back to Oakland."

He'd remain with Tower of Power until the mid-1980s, when he decided to trade in the touring life in favor of spending more time with his family. Then, after 25 years away, he'd rejoin the seminal Oakland act from 2009 to 2011.

Beyond Tower, Gillette was also a member of two other highly influential Bay Area rock acts -- The Sons of Champlin and Cold Blood. He also spent some time in Blood, Sweat and Tears, the jazz-rock act known for such popular tunes as "Spinning Wheel." His talents were greatly valued by some of the biggest artists in the world. Over the decades, Gillette recorded and performed with such platinum-selling outfits as the Rolling Stones, Rod Stewart, Elton John, Sheryl Crow and the Doobie Brothers, among many others.
 
<script async="" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script><iframe style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden; display: none; width: 0px; height: 0px; padding: 0px; border: medium none;" allowfullscreen="true" allowtransparency="true" scrolling="no" id="rufous-sandbox" frameborder="0"></iframe><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Our brother Maurice White passed peacefully in his sleep this morning.<br><br>The light is he, shining on you and me. <a href="https://t.co/ppWTHKUyG6">pic.twitter.com/ppWTHKUyG6</a></p>&mdash; Earth, Wind &amp; Fire (@EarthWindFire) <a href="https://twitter.com/EarthWindFire/status/695380702183829504">February 4, 2016</a></blockquote>
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B.T. Express

Kashif (then Michael Jones) started out in the band B.T. Express. He wasn't an original member though. He's the keyboardist
 
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | Friday, January 13, 2017 | NY Daily News
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This Aug. 2016 photo provided by courtesy of Tower of Power/Webster Public Relations, shows the band members from Tower of Power, from left, Rocco Prestia, Roger Smith, Sal Cracchiolo, Adolfo Acosta, Stephen "Doc" Kupka, Marcus Scott, Tom E. Politzer, Emilio Castillo, David Garibaldi, and Jerry Cortez.

OAKLAND, Calif. — Two members of Tower of Power, a group that has been an R&B institution for nearly 50 years, were hit by a train Thursday night as they walked across tracks before a performance in their hometown of Oakland, but both survived, their publicist said.

Calling it an "unfortunate accident," publicist Jeremy Westby said in a statement that drummer David Garibaldi and bass player Marc van Wageningen are "responsive and being treated at a local hospital."

Bandleader Emilio Castillo said in a statement Friday that he visited Garibaldi in the hospital Thursday night, but he couldn't see van Wageningen because he was in intensive care.

"Dave's head and face were pretty swollen and bruised but he was lucid and expected to recover," Castillo said. "Marc came through surgery well; his internal bleeding was stopped and they were waiting for him to stabilize in order to do further testing. The doctors were cautiously optimistic. We appreciate the responses and prayers from our former bandmates, friends, and fans and we all remain hopeful and in prayer."

Garibaldi has been with the group since 1970. Van Wageningen is substituting as bass player.

Without identifying them, the Oakland Fire Department said earlier that two pedestrians were hit by a passenger train at Jack London Square about 7:30 p.m. and taken to a hospital.

The accident was near Yoshi's, a jazz and R&B club where the group had been scheduled to play two shows Thursday night. Both were canceled.

It wasn't clear why the men were on the tracks, but pedestrians often need to cross them in the area with trains running across and in between streets, including right outside Yoshi's.

The Tower of Power, a band of about a dozen members, most of them horns, has been beloved members of the R&B and pop communities since forming in Oakland in 1968. The group and its rotating cast of musicians have recorded behind many far more famous names including Elton John, Otis Redding, Aerosmith and Santana.

They were also a national TV fixture in the 1980s with frequent appearances on "Late Night With David Letterman."

Tributes and well wishes were quickly emerging on Twitter, including one from pop star and drummer Sheila E., who tweeted "Pleez pray for my frenz."

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Please pray for David Garibaldi &amp; Marc Van Wageningen of Tower of Power; they were involved in a serious accident this evening in Oakland.</p>&mdash; Lenny Williams (@LennyWilliams) <a href="https://twitter.com/LennyWilliams/status/819783722866049024">January 13, 2017</a></blockquote>
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3/15/2017 by Gail Mitchell Billboard
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Maxx Kidd, a music industry veteran who helped pioneer go-go music, died March 13 in Chevy Chase, Maryland, Billboard has learned. The 75-year-old Kidd passed away following a years-long battle with “a variety of health complications,” according to surviving family members.

Born Carl Lomax Kidd on Aug. 18, 1941, Kidd was a young man growing up in West Virginia when he met singer Nat “King” Cole” at a nightclub owned by Kidd’s father. That sparked an interest in pursuing a career in music, which Kidd started in earnest in 1960 when he relocated to Washington, D.C. following a stint in the army. It was there that Kidd parlayed his pre-army job as a Calypso singer for a drive-in restaurant into becoming a member of a local D.C. soul group called The Enjoyables.

Kidd’s first major industry breakthrough was working as a producer for Curtis Mayfield’s Curtom Records, where he collaborated with such artists as Jerry Butler, Gene Chandler and Chuck Brown & the Soul Searchers. Two R&B hits by Brown, “Blow Your Whistle” and “We Need Some Money,” are among Kidd’s best-known productions.

Four years later, Kidd played a role in producing and supporting D.C.’s infamous go-go sound, working with Brown & the Soul Searchers as well as fellow funk groups Trouble Funk and E.U. (Experience Unlimited). Kidd also served as an associate producer of the 1986 film Good to Go, a crime thriller starring Art Garfunkel that used D.C.’s burgeoning go-go scene as its musical backdrop. Kidd co-produced the film’s go-go/dancehall-inspired soundtrack as well, featuring Chuck Brown, Trouble Funk, E.U., Sly Dunbar & Robbie Shakespeare, Ini Kamoze and Redds & the Boys (whose lineup included Kidd).

In addition to establishing his own record label, T.T.E.D. Records, Kidd became an independent promoter and marketer, with a client list that included the O’Jays, the Temptations, Lou Rawls, Van McCoy, Johnnie Taylor and Shalamar.

Kidd is survived by five daughters (Jacqueline McCoy, Yvette “Evie” Kidd, Sabrina Kidd, Joy Kidd, Corie Kidd) and one son (Victor Kidd), 11 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren plus four siblings and a son-in-law. Funeral arrangements are pending.

Here's an interview done in the late 1980s:
[video=youtube;8Lm5sm8Dr3o]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Lm5sm8Dr3o[/video]
 
By Jon Pareles April 27, 2018 New York Times
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Charles Neville onstage during a performance with the Neville Brothers at the 2008 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

Charles Neville, the saxophonist in New Orleans’s most celebrated band, the Neville Brothers, died on Friday at his home in Huntington, Mass. He was 79.

His family announced his death, of pancreatic cancer, in an online statement. On Facebook, his brother and bandmate Aaron Neville, wrote, “You’ll always be in my heart and soul, like a tattoo.”

The Neville Brothers gathered New Orleans’s abundant musical heritage and carried it forward. Art, Aaron, Charles and Cyril Neville formed their band in 1977 and maintained it, amid other projects, until disbanding in 2012. (They reunited for a farewell concert in New Orleans in 2015.)

The group melded rhythm and blues, gospel, doo-wop, rock, blues, soul, jazz, funk and New Orleans’s own parade and Mardi Gras rhythms, in songs that mingled a party spirit with social consciousness.

Charles Neville — who usually performed in a beret and a tie-dyed shirt, with an irrepressible smile — was the band’s jazz facet, reflecting his decades of experience before the Neville Brothers got started. His soprano saxophone was upfront on the Nevilles’ “Healing Chant,” which won a Grammy Award as best pop instrumental in 1990.

Charles Neville was born in New Orleans on Dec. 28, 1938, the second of the four sons of Arthur Lanon Neville Sr. and Amelia Neville, formerly Landry. At 15, Charles left home to play saxophone with the Rabbit’s Foot Minstrel Show.

He went on to work with blues and R&B singers, including Larry Wiliams, Johnny Ace, Big Maybelle, Jimmy Reed and Little Walter. Back in New Orleans, he was a member of the house band at the Dew Drop Inn, working with local and visiting stars.
After serving in the Navy from 1956 to 1958, stationed in Memphis, he went on to tour with B. B. King and Bobby (Blue) Bland.
Mr. Neville began using heroin in the 1950s, sometimes shoplifting to support his drug use and serving short jail terms. It was a habit he would not completely overcome until 1986.
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The Neville Brothers on a visit to New York City in 1989. From left, Cyril, Art, Charles and Aaron.

He was arrested on charges of possession of marijuana in 1963 and imprisoned for three and a half years at the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola. He stayed in practice by playing with other jailed musicians, including the great New Orleans pianist James Booker.

Upon his release he moved to New York City. He became involved in modern jazz and toured with soul singers like Johnnie Taylor, Clarence Carter and O. V. Wright.

He returned to New Orleans in 1976 for a recording project: “The Wild Tchoupitoulas,” which brought the Mardi Gras Indian tribe led by his uncle George Landry (a. k. a. Big Chief Jolly) into the studio with a band featuring his nephews, the four Neville brothers. The album’s fusion of traditional street chants and funk made it a cornerstone of modern New Orleans music.

The brothers decided to keep working together. In New Orleans, the Neville Brothers were a supergroup. Art Neville had sung the 1954 hit “Mardi Gras Mambo” and in 1969 formed the influential New Orleans funk band the Meters, which Cyril Neville later joined. Aaron Neville had a Top 10 pop hit in 1966 with “Tell It Like It Is.”

The brothers brought their old repertoires and a growing new one to their concerts, gaining nationwide and worldwide followings on tour. They were the perennial finale on the main stage at the annual New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and played New Year’s Eve shows at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco.

The Neville Brothers recorded more than a dozen studio and live albums, although the only one to sell as many as a half-million copies was “Yellow Moon” (1989).

Mr. Neville also recorded with Diversity, a group mixing jazz and classical musicians, and with Native American musicians in the group Songcatchers. He released an album as a leader, “Safe in Buddha’s Palm” — the title reflected his longtime interest in Eastern philosophies — in 2008.

In the 1990s he moved to rural Massachusetts, and he performed with his sons, Khalif and Talyn, as the New England Nevilles. But he returned often to New Orleans, and after the Neville Brothers disbanded in 2012 he joined Aaron Neville’s touring band; he also performed in New Orleans with a daughter, the singer Charmaine Neville. Failing health prevented him from joining a Neville family reunion concert in 2017.

In addition to his three brothers, he is survived by his wife, Kristin Neville; his sister, Althelgra Neville Gabriel; and his children — Charmaine, Khalif, Talyn, Charlotte, Carlos and Charles Neville; Charlene White, Rowena Alix and Charlestine Jones — as well as numerous grandchildren.
 
George Johnson interview on Questlove Supreme (episode 107)

Here's a new interview by George form the Brothers Johnson. You can listen to it here.
 
By Noah Yoo<time class="content-header__publish-date"> • April 25, 2020 • Pitchfork
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</time>Hamilton Bohannon has died. The percussionist, bandleader, and music producer who started his music career as the drummer for a young Stevie Wonder in the mid-1960s passed away on Friday, April 24, as the Newnan Times-Herald reports. He was 78 years old.

Bohannon grew up in Newnan, Georgia, a city 40 miles southwest of Atlanta. After finding a passion for the drums at a young age, he played with student groups and bands throughout his school years, eventually attending Clark College on a music scholarship. While on tour with Gorgeous George—playing with a then-unknown guitarist named Jimi Hendrix—Bohannon was introduced to a young Stevie Wonder. After a stint playing with Wonder, he struck up a working relationship with Berry Gordy and became the bandleader for other Motown acts, including Marvin Gaye, the Four Tops, and Diana Ross and the Supremes, among others.

When Motown moved to Los Angeles from Detroit at the beginning of the '70s, Bohannon opted to remain in Detroit, eventually making the jump to solo artist and record producer. He is credited by many as being one of the first innovators of disco; his first hit, “South African Man,” was released in 1974, and he released albums on Dakar and Mercury throughout the '70s. His discography has been sampled by a slew of artists, including Jay Z, Snoop Dogg, and Digable Planets, and he was immortalized on Tom Tom Club’s 1981 track “Genius of Love.”In February 2020, Bohannon released his final single – “Bohannon Combination Gumbo Mix”.

As the years went on, Bohannon relocated back to his hometown in Georgia, where he established himself as a presence. In 2017, Newnan renamed a street after the musician in honor of his accomplishments and contributions to the community. “They asked about renaming the street, and I was blown away. But I give thanks to those who still live on that street and allowed this to happen. It means the world to me,” he told the Times-Herald. “The street where I was born, that same dirt street where my parents worked so hard for us—it’s incredible. It’s a very sacred thing.”
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DuranDuran said:
By Noah Yoo<time class="content-header__publish-date"> • April 25, 2020 • Pitchfork
Hamilton%252520Bohannon.png

</time>Hamilton Bohannon has died. The percussionist, bandleader, and music producer who started his music career as the drummer for a young Stevie Wonder in the mid-1960s passed away on Friday, April 24, as the Newnan Times-Herald reports. He was 78 years old.

Bohannon grew up in Newnan, Georgia, a city 40 miles southwest of Atlanta. After finding a passion for the drums at a young age, he played with student groups and bands throughout his school years, eventually attending Clark College on a music scholarship. While on tour with Gorgeous George—playing with a then-unknown guitarist named Jimi Hendrix—Bohannon was introduced to a young Stevie Wonder. After a stint playing with Wonder, he struck up a working relationship with Berry Gordy and became the bandleader for other Motown acts, including Marvin Gaye, the Four Tops, and Diana Ross and the Supremes, among others.

When Motown moved to Los Angeles from Detroit at the beginning of the '70s, Bohannon opted to remain in Detroit, eventually making the jump to solo artist and record producer. He is credited by many as being one of the first innovators of disco; his first hit, “South African Man,” was released in 1974, and he released albums on Dakar and Mercury throughout the '70s. His discography has been sampled by a slew of artists, including Jay Z, Snoop Dogg, and Digable Planets, and he was immortalized on Tom Tom Club’s 1981 track “Genius of Love.”In February 2020, Bohannon released his final single – “Bohannon Combination Gumbo Mix”.

As the years went on, Bohannon relocated back to his hometown in Georgia, where he established himself as a presence. In 2017, Newnan renamed a street after the musician in honor of his accomplishments and contributions to the community. “They asked about renaming the street, and I was blown away. But I give thanks to those who still live on that street and allowed this to happen. It means the world to me,” he told the Times-Herald. “The street where I was born, that same dirt street where my parents worked so hard for us—it’s incredible. It’s a very sacred thing.”
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Click to expand...
Just read this piece. Loved it. Learnt lots of new stuff.
 
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