Joey Ramone

popular name: Rob Tyner

date_of_death: September 18, 1991

age: 46

cause_of_death: Heart attack

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Although he originally auditioned as the bass player, Rob Tyner was the original lead singer for the original All American Detroit garage band MC5. It was Tyner who issued the rallying cry of "kick out the jams, motherfuckers" at the MC5's live concerts from 1964-72. As Rob once said, "We were Punk before there was Punk. We were New Wave before there was New Wave. We were Metal before there was Metal, and we were MC before there was Hammer."

popular name: Bunk Johnson

date_of_death: July 7, 1949

age: 63

cause_of_death: Lingering effects of a stroke

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Willie "Bunk" Johnson was an prominent jazz trumpeter in New Orleans who lied and/or exaggerated his role in the development of jazz that historians have a difficult time understanding the truth from fiction. But what everyone agrees on is that Johnson was regarded as one of the leading trumpeters in New Orleans in the years 1905–1915, in between repeatedly leaving the city to tour with minstrel shows and circus bands. In the 1920’s and 1930’s, Bunk Johnson spent much of his music-playing time in the southwest Louisiana/southeast Texas region with New Iberia, Louisiana as his “base” and primary residence. While in the area he played frequently with the locally-based Banner Band, which traveled in a variety of vehicles to nearby southern Louisiana and Texas towns. Unlike many other jazz musicians Bunk did not achieve great monetary wealth, but he never shied away from jobs that helped supplement his music income. Along the path of his life, Johnson worked in such jobs as funeral parlor work in Texas, dock work in San Francisco, cigar-making work in the upper mid-west, rice processing and sugar cane field truck-driving in Iberia Parish, and a music teacher in the Iberia Parish, Louisiana school system. In 1942 William Russell and two other jazz researchers went to New Orleans and made a series of records of Bunk playing with a band that included George Lewis (clarinet) and Jim Robinson (trombone). The researchers also interviewed Johnson, who claimed he had taught Louis Armstrong and Joe "King" Oliver (actually Louis Armstrong admitted he mimicked King Oliver and Bunk Johnson style - but never was taught by Bunk). With the help from contacts in Cleveland and the new recordings, Johnson set off on a wild seven-year jazz history odyssey, playing in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, New York, New Orleans, Chicago and Philadelphia, being praised by the press, and making dozens of records that were said to be authentic recreations of the earliest forms of jazz. The enthusiastic jazz researchers who found Johnson and promoted him, quickly discovered, however, they had created something of a monster. According to the many, Bunk emerged as essentially a manipulative con man, often begging the researchers for money, frequently getting drunk, and sometimes failing to show up for concerts. Eventually, Johnson managed to alienate most of his friends. Sidney Bechet fired him from his band and Armstrong, who in 1939 praised Bunk as his "life-long inspiration," later said angrily, "Bunk taught me nothing!" The Bunk Johnson saga ended when he suffered two strokes in late 1948. He died the following July.

popular name: Michel Berger

date_of_death: August 2, 1992

age: 44

cause_of_death: Heart attack

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Michel Berger was a popular French singer and songwriter and a leading figure of France's pop music scene for two decades as a singer. As a songwriter he was active for such artists as his wife France Gall, Françoise Hardy and Johnny Hallyday. Berger first became known to the French public in the 1960s as singer of hit song Salut les copains, after which he became record producer and songwriter. In the early 1970s he produced the early albums of Véronique Sanson, and Allah once again in 1989. In 1973, he was responsible for producing the album Message personnel, the title track of which relaunched Françoise Hardy's career. He also produced the single Je suis moi for Hardy. Berger started writing for France Gall in 1974, produced all her albums from 1975 on, and married her the following year. In 1978, he composed the musical: Starmania, with lyrics by Luc Plamondon. The musical starred Gall, Claude Dubois, Daniel Balavoine, Diane Dufresne, Nanette Workman, Éric Estève and Fabienne Thibeault and was a big success in France in the 1980s and 1990s. Unfortunately his career stalled when his next two productions failed and he was under pressure to deliver another best seller. But at the age of 44, Berger suffered a heart attack while playing tennis, and despite the pleas of friends and family, he made his way up the hill to his home in Ramatuelle, France and suffered two more heart attacks in bed. He died waiting for the ambulance that was stuck in traffic from all the tourist in St. Tropez.