Ike Turner dies

[UntouchedTakeaway]

I didn't see a thread on this one (I looked - honest!) :D

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/Music/12/12/obit.ike.turner.ap/index.html

VCNJ~

[NurseCarmen]

I wanna keep a webcam on the grave. You know Tina will be showing up shortly for a dance.

[Frostillicus]

Ike Turner was still alive? I would've lost a bar bet on that nugget!

[Pine Fresh Scent]

Saw this on another site and couldn't stop laughing: "Ike Turner beats Tina to death."

That's GOLD Jerry! (the witticism, not spouse abuse)

[Diceman]

Saw this on another site and couldn't stop laughing: "Ike Turner beats Tina to death."
I really feel terrible that I'm laughing my ass off right now :D

[BaneSidhe]

I wanna keep a webcam on the grave. You know Tina will be showing up shortly for a dance.

Yup, yup yup!

[Johnny L.A.]

Huh. It was either yesterday or Thursday that I asked a coworker if Ike Turner was still alive. I looked him up on Wiki and he was.

Is there anyone else I should ask my coworker about? :D

[Bryan Ekers]

He's slappin' angels around now.

[elelle]

Man, he was surely a mess, with his personal life, but just as surely a powerhouse musician, who ushered in the era of rock-n-roll with Rocket 88 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_88), now acknowledged as the first Rock-n-Roll recording, helping Sun Studios rise to fame and changing the earbones of America.

He was a bridge between the blues music of his Clarksdale, Mississippi youth, where he paid good attention and learned from the brilliant musicians there. He acted as a hustler for the music of the time; as a talent scout who helped get Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, Elmore James and others up and recorded on Sun: pianist, vocalist and guitarist on many sessions. He was an incredible force; as a producer and bandleader, touring the US with his amped up revue in the fifties when it wasn't so easy to do that as a Black band. For all the personal abuse issues that surfaced later, his musical partnership with Tina Turner gave rise to a prominent dynamic couple who were the royalty of African American music of the time. Tina was the voice that Ike needed to get his musical ideas through, she was the damn force in that. (And, continued and rose into her ownself beyond that in the eighties)

I last saw Ike playing 10 years ago, in Clarksdale, MS, his hometown. He still had every bit of energy, and could command a revue band excellently.

RIP, Ike, hope you get some peace, and thanks for the riffs, gifts, and prominent shifts.

[BrainGlutton]

I love you, Kevin Nealon!

[GuanoLad]

I thoughted he was already long deaded.

[Sampiro]

I knew he was alive but I was surprised to learn he was only 76. I'd have thought he was older- hell, he was playing rock'n'roll almost 60 years ago. He was truly, warts and all, one of the fathers of that genre.

Pity that like Joan Crawford he'll only be remembered as an abusive psycho (and that mostly from the movie, which even Tina says was embellished [among other things it depicted him as the father of her oldest son, which he wasn't- they didn't become romantically involved until well after that child and weren't legally married until near the end of their act).

I read somewhere he's been married (not always in the legal sense) something like 14 times. No idea how many kids he had.

Well anyway, RIP Ike. In your honor I'll wear black. And blue.

[Annie-Xmas]

I betcha Tina Turner is doing one helluva Happy Dance.

[Annie-Xmas]

And here's that headline, courtesy of the New York Post:

IKE 'BEATS' TINA TO DEATH (http://www.nypost.com/seven/12132007/news/nationalnews/ike_beats_tina_to_death_79527.htm)

[WordMan]

Man, he was surely a mess, with his personal life, but just as surely a powerhouse musician, who ushered in the era of rock-n-roll with Rocket 88 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_88), now acknowledged as the first Rock-n-Roll recording, helping Sun Studios rise to fame and changing the earbones of America.

He was a bridge between the blues music of his Clarksdale, Mississippi youth, where he paid good attention and learned from the brilliant musicians there. He acted as a hustler for the music of the time; as a talent scout who helped get Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, Elmore James and others up and recorded on Sun: pianist, vocalist and guitarist on many sessions. He was an incredible force; as a producer and bandleader, touring the US with his amped up revue in the fifties when it wasn't so easy to do that as a Black band. For all the personal abuse issues that surfaced later, his musical partnership with Tina Turner gave rise to a prominent dynamic couple who were the royalty of African American music of the time. Tina was the voice that Ike needed to get his musical ideas through, she was the damn force in that. (And, continued and rose into her ownself beyond that in the eighties)

I last saw Ike playing 10 years ago, in Clarksdale, MS, his hometown. He still had every bit of energy, and could command a revue band excellently.

RIP, Ike, hope you get some peace, and thanks for the riffs, gifts, and prominent shifts.


I was coming in to make comments like this - great work, elelle. He may have been an awful human, but he was a great musician and at the nexus of a lot of important stuff...

Here's Rocket 88 with a montage and overview of its history on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbfnh1oVTk0) (oh, and Bettie Page, too!)

[Zebra]

Rolling on the riv-eerrrrr

[Hampshire]

This headline (http://blog.cleveland.com/entertainment/2007/12/the_morning_after_172.html) is pretty funny when read as a commentary on the state of popular music:

The morning after Ike Turner dies Miley Cyrus books more dates and Liza Minelli collapses.

[Chefguy]

A genius with a serious character flaw. Not all that uncommon, you know. Unfortunately, it overshadowed his tremendous talent. The music world has lost a giant, and there's no taking away from that with all the easy cheap shots.

[Cluricaun]

Rolling on the riv-eerrrrr

Floating, not rolling. :D

[Annie-Xmas]

Floating, not rolling. :D

Rolling on the riverrrr.....Styx!

And boy, would that be a funny cover.

[Don Draper]

I imagine Tina's shopping for a bright-red dress just about now...

[Sampiro]

I betcha Tina Turner is doing one helluva Happy Dance.

Probably not- she's probably just "Hmm. Ike's dead."

I just hope she doesn't pull a Cher, who did the big tearful meltdown eulogy at Sonny's funeral.

Then filed a $1.6 million claim against his estate that if paid would have left his wife and small kids nearly indigent. (Due to bad investments/funding his own campaigns/odd business dealings he didn't die broke, but neither was he a multimillionaire; his estate was worth about the amount of megamillionaire Cher's claim.)

[Euthanasiast]

I wish I could find it on YouTube, but David Allen Greer (sp?) on In Living Color did one hell of a parody of Ike doing a Tina Turner video (What Ike Had to Do With It, I think) and it was one of the funniest things I had ever seen.

You must understand, the force of my backhand, make your jaw bone crack
Ain't gone take no more sass from your black monkey ass... (forget the rest of that line)

What Ike hat to do, hat to do wid it
Why take your lip when your lip can get busted?

[Marley23]

Probably not- she's probably just "Hmm. Ike's dead."
USA Today quoted her manager as saying she hadn't had any contact with him in 35 years - which I think it a bad estimate, since they divorced in 1976 - and has no other comment.

[Don Draper]

I wish I could find it on YouTube, but David Allen Greer (sp?) on In Living Color did one hell of a parody of Ike doing a Tina Turner video (What Ike Had to Do With It, I think) and it was one of the funniest things I had ever seen.

I couldn't find that on youtube. But I did find a clip of Ike & Tina on the Midnight Special, performing Proud Mary (http://youtube.com/watch?v=zdg4xeK9F9Q). Given Tina's later revelations, the 'prologue' she inserts in the song ("We never ever do things nice & EASY. We like doing things nice & ROUGH!!") is so horribly ironic. No wonder it tends to get snipped out whenever the song is played nowadays.

[Guinastasia]

Probably not- she's probably just "Hmm. Ike's dead."

I just hope she doesn't pull a Cher, who did the big tearful meltdown eulogy at Sonny's funeral.



I don't think Sonny ever slapped the hell out of Cher.

[elelle]

Thanks, N&I Superman, for that YouTubey; it took a bajillion years to load on my slow dialup, but soooo worth it. That was exactly the kind of stuff that Ike did to change the whole world musically. Yep, Tina was the dynamic incredible singer, but Ike was the bandleader that made it all happen.

An interesting musical aside; Pinetop Perkins, the pianist who greatly inspired the young Ike(from the Wikiplace (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ike_Turner)) is still going strong at 93 years old.

Turner was soon carrying amplifiers for blues singer Robert Nighthawk, who often played live on WROX. Ike was mesmerized by Nighthawk's playing, but nothing could equal the experience of hearing Pinetop Perkins on piano for the first time. Growing up, his idol Pinetop Perkins helped teach the young Ike to play boogie-woogie on the piano. Ike soon was enamored of other blues artists such as Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller), Elmore James, Muddy Waters and Little Walter[3].

Pinetop has been nominated for two Grammys (http://www.pinetopperkins.com/) this coming year. He is one of the oldest last living bluesmen, and a wonderful man. I'm hoping that the bit of press of him being Ike's mentor will tip it over to him getting the Grammy.

Here's another photo (http://www.cazorla.es/bluescazorla06/img/pinetop.gif), featuring his incredibly beautiful Piano hands.

[Marley23]

Hmm. I guess one of the best jokes in my Simpsons script just passed into the realm of bad taste:

I'm leaving Krusty! I'm tired of being Tina Turner to his Ike!

[jackelope]

About four years ago I happened to see Ike stepping out of a limo in downtown Memphis. elelle covered this better than I could, but the man had amazing talent in addition to his well publicized flaws. "Rocket 88" still makes me dance. And I can't dance.

[Sampiro]

I don't think Sonny ever slapped the hell out of Cher.

He may not, but I sure did. Had to do with a bagel I found in my bed during the height of our affair. It's why we're not together now.

But I'm much better these days.

[China Guy]

An interesting musical aside; Pinetop Perkins, the pianist who greatly inspired the young Ike(from the Wikiplace (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ike_Turner)) is still going strong at 93 years old.

Pinetop has been nominated for two Grammys (http://www.pinetopperkins.com/) this coming year. He is one of the oldest last living bluesmen, and a wonderful man. I'm hoping that the bit of press of him being Ike's mentor will tip it over to him getting the Grammy.

Here's another photo (http://www.cazorla.es/bluescazorla06/img/pinetop.gif), featuring his incredibly beautiful Piano hands.Dang, thanks for sharing. I saw Pinetop with Muddy in 1980 and didn't know he was still pounding the ivory.

[Sampiro]

Hmm. I guess one of the best jokes in my Simpsons script just passed into the realm of bad taste:

Or the line from the movie Liar Liar:

Where would Tina Turner be right now if she'd rolled over and said, "Hit me again, Ike, and put some stank on it!"? Rollin' on the river, that's where she'd be. But she's beyond Thunderdome, because she decided to send a message!

[Fourth Wall]

Early (NBC) David Letterman skit with the Book Lady, right about the time Tina was making her comeback:
"Womens Be Thinkin' Too Much" by Ike Turner.