OFF : Sad news about Skip

[Jon Browne]

from alt.music.psychedelic

I know Skip had some fans here, myself included.
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Skip Spence, Of Moby Grape And Jeff Airplane, Dies
12:09 a.m. Apr 18, 1999 Eastern


SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Skip Spence, an original member of the rock
group Jefferson Airplane and founder of the short-lived but
influential band Moby Grape, died Friday, hospital officials said. He
was 52.

Spence, who had long battled alcoholism, schizophrenia and periods of
homelessness, died just weeks before the release of ''More Oar,'' a CD
album tribute to him featuring musicians including Beck, Robert Plant,
Tom Waits and members of R.E.M., the San Francisco Chronicle said
Saturday.

``His body just gave out,'' Spence's son Omar told the Chronicle after
his father's death in a Santa Cruz hospital, where he was taken April
5 and placed on a ventilator.
``We tried our best to extend him, but it got to he point where it
would have been inhumane. Anybody can live on life support, but that's
not living.''

Born Alexander Lee Spence in Ontario, Canada in 1946, Skip Spence
moved to California and became a key part of the thriving San
Francisco music scene in the 1960s and early 1970s, starting out as a
drummer with Jefferson Airplane and moving on to found Moby Grape in
1966. He is also credited with suggesting that the local rock group
Pud get itself a new name -- which it did, as the Doobie Brothers.
With Moby Grape, Spence reverted to playing his original instrument --
the guitar -- and quickly developed a national following as a skilled
and inventive songwriter.

Spence released his solo album ``Oar,'' an instant and surviving cult
classic, in 1968.

By 1969, drug and mental problems had forced Spence out of Moby Grape,
beginning a long and painful decline which eventually left him
homeless in and around the coastal town of Santa Cruz, living on
welfare and handouts.

Omar Spence, one of Spence's four children, said his father had
conquered an addiction to alcohol in recent years, but was unable to
defeat a host of medical problems including pneumonia and congestive
heart failure. The official cause of his death was listed as lung
cancer.

Before his death Spence was given a copy of the upcoming tribute
album, and Omar Spence said it was playing during his final hour in
the Dominican Hospital.

``My dad knew he was good,'' Omar Spence told the Chronicle. ''He was
still a star, to the day he died.''
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--
Jon