Farewell Roger

AndyPlankton

Another one gone, Rankin Roger from The Beat

ajmiller

Oh no! Too young!

ExAsperis99

We once did a couple of dates with Big Audio Dynamite in the mid-90s, and Roger was part of the lineup. They were such awesome people. At one point before the first show, Mick Jones and Roger came into our dressing room to say hi. “Hi, I’m Mick,” says Mick Jones, guitarist of the the Only Band That Matters (for those who might not know, THE CLASH).
We’re like, Yeah we know!
Roger shakes our hands too. We are a little stunned. Huge Beat fans, and General Public too.
Then our singer coughs the cough of a regular smoker, and Roger recognizes a fellow herb enthusiast. He pulls out a gallon ziploc bag of weed, reaches in and pulls out a HANDFUL and offers it to our singer. You know, so he doesn’t go wanting.
Have a good show, they said and took off.

JohnnyGoodyear

@ExAsperis99 said:
We once did a couple of dates with Big Audio Dynamite in the mid-90s, and Roger was part of the lineup. They were such awesome people. At one point before the first show, Mick Jones and Roger came into our dressing room to say hi. “Hi, I’m Mick,” says Mick Jones, guitarist of the the Only Band That Matters (for those who might not know, THE CLASH).
We’re like, Yeah we know!
Roger shakes our hands too. We are a little stunned. Huge Beat fans, and General Public too.
Then our singer coughs the cough of a regular smoker, and Roger recognizes a fellow herb enthusiast. He pulls out a gallon ziploc bag of weed, reaches in and pulls out a HANDFUL and offers it to our singer. You know, so he doesn’t go wanting.
Have a good show, they said and took off.

Good story and happy days. Odd that I now look back on the 90s as simpler times, must be a function of age....

AndyPlankton

@ExAsperis99 said:
We once did a couple of dates with Big Audio Dynamite in the mid-90s, and Roger was part of the lineup. They were such awesome people. At one point before the first show, Mick Jones and Roger came into our dressing room to say hi. “Hi, I’m Mick,” says Mick Jones, guitarist of the the Only Band That Matters (for those who might not know, THE CLASH).
We’re like, Yeah we know!
Roger shakes our hands too. We are a little stunned. Huge Beat fans, and General Public too.
Then our singer coughs the cough of a regular smoker, and Roger recognizes a fellow herb enthusiast. He pulls out a gallon ziploc bag of weed, reaches in and pulls out a HANDFUL and offers it to our singer. You know, so he doesn’t go wanting.
Have a good show, they said and took off.

Awesome, I love hearing stories like this.

ExAsperis99

In all my travels as a musician, it just hit me: The true aßholes you meet are almost never people who play music.

ExAsperis99

And this is kind of a tangent, but it reminds me of this excellent story Dave Wakeling tells about meeting Pete Townshend.

ExAsperis99

I'm totally spamming this thread, and I apologize, but the weed story is better than I remembered. It happened after the gig, after the introductions. The BAD crew was passing around a joint, the singer just reminded me, and he took his turn, unaware that Brits mix their weed with tobacco. Not a cigarette smoker, the singer coughed up a lung and Roger was concerned. He explained that Americans tended to take their cannabis neat, and THAT was when Roger reached in and gave him a snowball-size handful of weed.

AndyPlankton

@ExAsperis99 said:
I'm totally spamming this thread, and I apologize, but the weed story is better than I remembered. It happened after the gig, after the introductions. The BAD crew was passing around a joint, the singer just reminded me, and he took his turn, unaware that Brits mix their weed with tobacco. Not a cigarette smoker, the singer coughed up a lung and Roger was concerned. He explained that Americans tended to take their cannabis neat, and THAT was when Roger reached in and gave him a snowball-size handful of weed.

hahaha even better

CracklePot

Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

I said “STOP!”

A ranking full stop.

Sadness. I love me some Beat.

ExAsperis99

@CracklePot said:
Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

I said “STOP!”

A ranking full stop.

Sadness. I love me some Beat.

And you know the last line of that recording!?

AndyPlankton

@ExAsperis99 said:

@CracklePot said:
Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

I said “STOP!”

A ranking full stop.

Sadness. I love me some Beat.

And you know the last line of that recording!?

I'm dead

CracklePot

@AndyPlankton said:

@ExAsperis99 said:

@CracklePot said:
Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

Ready?
Are you ready to stop?

I said “STOP!”

A ranking full stop.

Sadness. I love me some Beat.

And you know the last line of that recording!?

I'm dead

I know.
I was gonna...
but I couldn’t bring myself to type it.

JohnnyGoodyear

@ExAsperis99 said:
In all my travels as a musician, it just hit me: The true aßholes you meet are almost never people who play music.

Quite so. Some exceptions, but not so many. That Mister Wakeling seems like a nice chap also. Fair way from Birmingham to the San Fernando Valley...

This from their website about RR: http://englishbeat.net/goodbye-dear-friend-rip-ranking-roger/

Janie

Definitely farewell to Roger.

Why on earth would anyone ruin perfectly good weed by mixing it with tobacco?

JohnnyGoodyear

ExAsperis99

@JohnnyGoodyear said:

@ExAsperis99 said:
In all my travels as a musician, it just hit me: The true aßholes you meet are almost never people who play music.

Quite so. Some exceptions, but not so many. That Mister Wakeling seems like a nice chap also. Fair way from Birmingham to the San Fernando Valley...

This from their website about RR: http://englishbeat.net/goodbye-dear-friend-rip-ranking-roger/

Thanks for that.

CracklePot

Listened to a lot of English Beat today.
It feels like this song is the perfect send off for the man.

AndyPlankton

@CracklePot said:
Listened to a lot of English Beat today.
It feels like this song is the perfect send off for the man.

Good choice.