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| JuanTCB |
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198353,00.html
The great singer-songwriter and performer Billy Preston, the real "Fifth Beatle," has died after a long illness as a result of malignant hypertension that resulted in kidney failure and other complications.
As a result of a medical insult, he'd been in a deep coma since last November 21, but was still struggling to recover. He died at Shea Scottsdale Hospital in Scottsdale, Ariz., where he'd lived for the last couple of years.
Billy was called the Fifth Beatle because he played keyboards on "Let It Be," "The White Album" and "Abbey Road." He also played on the Rolling Stones' hit song "Miss You," and often played with Eric Clapton. He also did the organ work on Sly & the Family Stone's greatest hits.
Preston's own hits include "Nothing From Nothing," "Will It Go Round in Circles" and "You Are So Beautiful," which Joe Cocker turned into an international hit.
Preston was actually mentored by Ray Charles, and acts like Little Richard (see below), Mahalia Jackson and James Cleveland had a huge impact on him at a young age.
In the early '60s, Billy went to Europe with Little Richard who was playing in Hamburg. The Beatles were the opening act, and as the story goes, he was the one who made sure they got fed.
His friendship with them lasted through the 1960s and he was the first act signed to Apple Records, thanks to George Harrison. The resulting album is called "That's the Way God Planned It."
In 1971, Preston played in "The Concert for Bangladesh." Last year, in one of his final appearances, he performed at a reunion in Los Angeles for the release of the Bangladesh DVD with Clapton and Harrison's son Dhani on guitar.
More recently, Billy can be heard on the latest albums by Neil Diamond and Red Hot Chili Peppers. He's also featured on the Starbucks soul album "Believe to My Soul," featuring Mavis Staples and Ann Peebles.
I had the good fortune to know Billy the last few years, and saw him perform — as chronicled in this column — last August at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut and last October at the Atlantis in the Bahamas.
He was one of those spectacular performers who put everything into his show, even though he had no working kidneys by then and was receiving dialysis. He was a warm, wonderful human being with a mile-wide smile. He was also a genius musician, the likes of whom we will not see again.
Rest in peace, Billy. You deserve it. |
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| Honky Tonk Man |
RIP Billy.
In your honour, tonight I'll find someone to do the "cock dance" with. Or is that taking it too far? |
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| Saint Sway |
tough week for keyboard players
RIP Billy P |
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| star star |
RIP Billy, your brilliant playing on our fave stones albums will not be forgotten, not will your wonderfully huge ego! |
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| erikjjf |
Very sad news.
Rest in peace, Billy. |
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| Jumacfly |
OMG...I m so sad to read this...Billy is part of the legend...Goodbye ol' brother and RIP 
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| keefkid |
RIP Billy... |
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| pdog |
If you die today, you go straight to heaven! |
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| lotsajizz |
glad he got to play with the boys again on 'Saint Of Me' before he died
RIP Billy
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| VoodooChileInWOnderl |
Billy, what a day to die!!
In fact I'm not sure of it was today, but based on the few news telling the story I think it was today.
I'm going to listen Billy's 1973 tour with Mick Taylor in his honor.
RIP |
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| MrPleasant |
So, what do Bill Wyman, Roman Polanski, the guy who played the principal in Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Billy Preston (R.I.P.) have in common?...
I'm sorry. May he rest in peace. I'll drink to that. |
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| shakedhandswithkeith |
fuck!! badest news of the month - RIP Bill!!! |
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| LadyJane |
Oh this is so sad!!
RIP Billy. I'll forget the cockdance in 1975.
LJ. |
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| JuanTCB |
quote:
Saint Sway wrote:
tough week for keyboard players
RIP Billy P
Totally. Mac better be looking both ways before he crosses the street. |
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| Sir Stonesalot |
See ya Billy....(insert gratutious rock n roll heaven comment here).
And 10 year old boys the world over breath a sigh of relief...... |
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| texile |
godd bless his funky soul...he's dancing right now.
for me, billy was one of the few, along with stu, nicky, bobby, who could at one point - call himself a 'fifth stone'.....
shine a light... |
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| Soldatti |
Very sad news. RIP Billy. |
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| hellobeatle |
he didnt play on Abbey Road or the White Album....
and George Martin was the fifth Beatle...
Preston's performances @ The Concert Fot George Harrison and for Bangladesh were amazing... the guy had great soul... |
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| Poplar |
Best Stones studio tracks w/ Billy? |
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| FPM C10 |
quote:
hellobeatle wrote:
he didnt play on Abbey Road or the White Album....
and George Martin was the fifth Beatle...
Preston's performances @ The Concert Fot George Harrison and for Bangladesh were amazing... the guy had great soul...
Well, he did play on the single version of "Revolution" (I think) and that was during the White Album sessions...and Murray the K was the fifth Beatle!
And didn't Mac play on "Miss You"????
I saw Billy twice and bitched about it both times. I paid to see George Harrison (1974) and the Rolling Stones (1975) and in the middle of BOTH shows had to sit through "Will It Go Round In Circles" and "Outta Space". Still, I'm sorry to see him go - liked his organ playing a LOT, his clavinet and electric piano much less.
He was great in "Concert For George". Also good on Clapton's Robert Johnson album.
RIP ...you can dance with Billy on the piano if you like.... |
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| jtorquetti |
Sad day. Goodbye.
R.I.P |
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| texile |
or rather sixth stone...
i didn't know he played on the chilli peppers last cd...
that's a great way to leave a legacy to another generation.
he wasn't on miss you though....but he helped mick write it during the mocambo shows. |
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| FotiniD |
Very sad indeed
RIP Billy Preston! |
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| Gazza |
Sad news, even though it's been on the cards for a while
RIP Billy |
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| TornAndFrayed |
Shocking news.
Time to crank up some ´75 shows in his honour...
R.I.P. Billy |
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| Joey |
R.I.P. Billy
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| Sir Stonesalot |
This has got to make the price of MaxLugar's mint condition "Billy Preston Action Figure" skyrocket...no? |
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| gustavobala |
quote:
FPM C10 wrote:
And didn't Mac play on "Miss You"????
I saw Billy twice and bitched about it both times. I paid to see George Harrison (1974) and the Rolling Stones (1975) and in the middle of BOTH shows had to sit through "Will It Go Round In Circles" and "Outta Space". Still, I'm sorry to see him go - liked his organ playing a LOT, his clavinet and electric piano much less.
RIP ...you can dance with Billy on the piano if you like....
the "miss you riff" was a ideia billy´s idea!
but mac plays!
ohh what a sad , sad day!
i am so sad,l i love billy musics.....shit, die in this day?
Rest In Peace, brother soul funk!
sad, sad....he never cames to brazil |
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| Gimme Shelter |
RIP Billy.
I saw him play with Clapton a few years ago. |
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| gustavobala |
from timeisonourside.com:
The idea for those (bass) lines came from Billy Preston, actually. We'd cut a rough demo a year or so earlier after a recording session. I'd already gone home, and Billy picked up my old bass when they started running through that song. He started doing that bit because it seemed to be the style of his left hand. So when we finally came to do the tune, the boys said, Why don't you work around Billy's idea? So I listened to it once and heard that basic run and took it from there. It took some changing and polishing, but the basic idea was Billy's.
- Bill Wyman, 1978
(W)e still work closely on songs. It still comes together even when we haven't seen each other for months. We help each other on songs like Miss You which came together during the 1976 tour of Europe. A lot of our songs take a long time to come out.
- Keith Richards, 1979
I got that together with Billy Preston, actually. Yeah, Billy had shown me the four-on-the-floor bass-drum part, and I would just play the guitar. I remember playing that in the El Mocambo club when Keith was on trial in Toronto for whatever he was doing. We were supposed to be there making this live record... I was still writing it, actually. We were just in rehearsal.
- Mick Jagger, 1995
We didn't intentionally set out to make a DIS-CO record. To me, it's just like... that bass drum beat and my falsettos just fit nicely around the bass part. Vocally, it's more gospel, because nowadays disco records are much more repetitive... you know, I wanna dance and shake my booty repeated 89 times!
- Mick Jagger, 1978
A lot of those songs like Miss You on Some Girls... were heavily influenced by going to the discos. You can hear it in a lot of those four on the floor rhythms and the Philadelphia-style drumming. Mick and I used to go to discos a lot... It was a great period. I remember being in Munich and coming back from a club with Mick singing one of the Village People songs - YMCA, I think it was - and Keith went mad, but it sounded great on the dance floor.
- Charlie Watts, 2003
(W)e didn't get together and say, Let's make a disco song. It was a rhythm that was popular and so we made a song like that.
- Ron Wood, 2003
Miss You is an emotion, it's not really about A girl. To me, the feeling of longing is what the song is - I don't like to interpret my own fucking songs - but that's what it is.
- Mick Jagger, 1978
(The part about the Puerto Rican girls): it's true, it's true. I mean that's what happens to you. Anyway, that's an imagined person. I get much more of a buzz or whatever you want to call it this year out of writing songs that are not totally within my experience. I imagine other people's experiences, you must realize that. It's imagination, observation... You combine the two. In the middle of the song I thought wouldn't it be funny if you're in New York and you're missing someone and you get these terrible crass people knocking on your door... I don't know, it's never happened to me. I don't sit around moping. It's fiction, somgwriting is fiction...
- Mick Jagger, 1978
I still like things like Miss You. I think that has a directness and feeling.
- Mick Jagger, 1984
(T)he amount of thump from Bill and Charlie is quite amazing.
- Keith Richards, 1978
Sugar Blue played harmonica on Miss You and Some Girls. He was somebody that Mick or Keith found playing on the street. The thing that blew my mind was what that guy could do, because I play a little harmonica. I know how to suck and bend, blow and bend like Jimmy Reed, but if you gave a harmonica to Sugar Blue, he could play in C, C sharp, C flat, B, A and F, all on the one harmonica. The way he bent it was unreal.
- Ron Wood, 2003
Although Miss You was a damn good disco record, it was calculated to be one.
- Keith Richards, 1997
Miss You really caught the moment, because that was the deal at the time. And that's what made that record take off.
- Mick Jagger, 1995
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