RIP Andy Gill

Andy Gill at Terminal West, Atlanta, March 15, 2015

Musicians die - often it feels like all the time - but this one hit me really hard.  Andy Gill, guitarist of the pioneering post-punk band Gang of Four, passed away yesterday.

GOF (the original Only Band That Matters) were one of my favorite bands for decades.  During their late 70s/early 80s heyday, I was particularly attached to their music, and if they weren't hands down my favorite band at the time it was only due to the simultaneous existence of The Au Pairs.  I had every Gang of Four LP and EP released at the time. 

According to Brian Eno, Jimi Hendrix was “the first properly electronic composer,” because he was the first to think of what he was playing in terms outside those of the instrument he was holding:

"He thought of what was happening with the floor pedals, the mixer, the speakers, the tape recorder. He thought consequentially, and his sound really is his music - whereas it's theoretically possible to distinguish sound from music (in terms of notes) in the playing of other guitarists. He was the first person to humanise an important part of rock technology, in other words." 

The same was even more true for Andy Gill.  To Gill, the electric guitar wasn't necessarily an instrument to produce certain notes or chords, but rather just one in a series of devices that can make any number of curious sounds that could be played, not with, but opposed to all the other instruments in a band.  As such, Gang of Four's music, while harnessing punk's intensity and energy, was most decidedly not punk rock and could only be called "post-punk," a genre GOF pretty much established as a new musical idiom.

Check out Gill's bracingly original guitar work in the song Anthrax:

My favorite Gang of Four song, though, and not coincidentally, one of Gill's most masterful performances, is To Hell With Poverty.  Please play this song as loud as you possibly can (it doesn't make much sense at lower volumes).

After Gill's air-raid-warning-like opening statement, that insistent, driving bass line, and the feral, almost tribal, chants, are there more appropriate lyrics for the Trump Era in America ("In this land, right now, some are insane but they're in charge. To hell with poverty, we'll get drunk on cheap wine!")?  

We'll miss you, Mr. Gill, and thank you for sharing your gift with  us.