\m/

R.I.P. Ronnie James Dio. Luckily for us, he did rock for a long, long time, and has now ascended to the higher realms to throw lightning down upon the evil wizards and demons.

This vid was actually shot in the Spectrum, also soon to be R.I.P. (which is a bunch of crap if you ask me, but no one did).

One of the best yet

R.I.P. Guru.

Below is "Full Clip" off of the best of Full Clip: A Decade of Gang Starr album, which I recommend you pick up.

J.D. Salinger, R.I.P.

For Jay

Jay Reatard was found dead today. While I'd heard a little about his non-musical antics — fights, firing his band, etc. — I never heard his music until seeing the below vid a while back. I dug the song and the vid, and I'll have to check out the rest of his stuff.

Warning: This vid contains a sort of evil looking clown. Not too bad, though, no need to call Maury Povich.

Adios amigo

Patrick Swayze, R.I.P.

Wolverines!

John Hughes, R.I.P.

It's being reported that wirter/director John Hughes died yesterday of a heart attack. Weird, since I was talking to someone tonight who just took an overnight job at Target. She hadn't seen Career Opportunities, and so didn't get my Jennifer Connelly in a white tank top reference.

Hughes probably did better movies — Weird Science and Ferris Bueller's Day Off come to mind — but I always liked Career Opportunities, which he wrote, for its weirdness and desperation. And, uh, Jennifer Connelly.

Hughes, RIP. Connelly, FTW.

Zezel, R.I.P.

Non-hockey fans might better recognize Peter Zezel as one of the background teammates in Youngblood, but 'round these parts he'll be remembered as a core member of the classic '80s Flyers team that lost in the Stanley Cup finals to Edmonton. Zezel died yesterday at age 44.

As a side note Youngblood, I can't say when I last saw the movie, but was the point really that he had to learn to fight to make the NHL? I mean, I remember it being pretty cheesy, but not that outright boneheaded.

Harry Kalas, R.I.P.

The games will go on, but will never sound as good without Harry the K announcing. It's hard to imagine a summer without Kalas as the voice of the Phillies, but then it was hard to imagine games without his longtime color man Richie Ashburn as well. He will be missed.

There is a fairly extensive write-up on his career here, as well as some vids and interviews, including the one below.

Free at last

Actor Patrick McGoohan died Tuesday, and I've been avoiding online discussion of the final episode of The Prisoner all day as I have yet to see it.

Incidentally, AMC has all the original Prisoner episodes available on its Web site in anticipation of its new miniseries. But I may just have to spring for the DVDs. I've seen about half of the original 17 episodes, and they are indeed weird and awesome.

As he himself has said, he'll always be best known as "Number Six" from that series, but he was pretty great any time I saw him. I especially liked him as the warden in Escape from Alcatraz, and as Longshanks in Braveheart. He also won two Emmys for his work on Columbo. Pretty much any Columbo episode is good times, but those I saw those episodes in syndication many years ago and they definitely stood out.

R.I.P Number Six.

UPDATE: AV Club's Zack Handlen posted a good write-up on McGoohan, which linked to another blogger's reaction. Interesting reads.

Evan Tanner, R.I.P.

MMA fighter, and former UFC middleweight champ Evan Tanner died yesterday at age 37.

From a fighting aspect, I always liked Tanner's style. He would stand in the pocket with anyone, and was always very relaxed on the ground, not leaping at the first chance to try and take someone's back, but rather patiently looking to extend the punishment before opponents retreated to their guard. Unfortunately as he got older, it was his younger, quicker opponents getting that big shot in during the stand up exchanges.

He was likely just as well known in recent years for his Internet presence. I remember T-Bone showing me Tanner's gallery of hilarious MySpace photos (no longer there), and Tanner would go on to be a pretty prolific blogger. His posts were often painfully personal, some detailing his struggles with alcohol, but always somehow positive as well. In addition to regular MySpace posts he frequently updated his own Web site with news of his plans and projects, and worked as a regular blogger for Spike TV. His honesty and good-naturedness might have won him more fans than his fighting, actually.

His early death would be tragic no matter the cause, but I was at least glad to see it was nothing related to his personal demons. He enjoyed exploring the outdoors, something I'm not surprised he enjoyed considering his life outlook and recent Grizly Adams appearance. RIP.

***

In other MMA news, Chuck Liddell sat at one of the featured tables during one of tonight's World Series of Poker broadcasts. Acting as if he just learned to play hours previous, he somehow still took a big pot off a pro Mark Seif (Seif's fault) and caught a lucky two-pair in a hand he should not have been in, but was bounced when his (lack of) skill caught up to his luck and he went all-in when he should definitely not have.

Oh, and Phil Helmuth came in dressed as Patton, or something. And while he said he wanted to go to Afghanistan to visit the troops, there was apparently no reason for the uniformed entrance. Unless I missed something while watching the Phillies. It was humorous, though.

Oh oh, and Phil Laak was disguised as an old man, in a Spike Jones-style make-up job. Again, for no reason.

When all you do is play poker, I guess it helps to liven it up once in a while.

In a world without Don LaFontaine

Did you enjoy that piece on great name holder and voiceover legend Don LaFontaine? Because he died yesterday. Now how do you feel?

So he doesn't go out on a lame Denny's joke, let's enjoy some of his work:



"His loyalty was to a child." Ha ha.



(Just a rad trailer on its own, too.) R.I.P. Don.