Sad news this morning is that drummer Chuck Biscuits died last weekend of throat cancer at the age of 44. He was a past member of D.O.A., Danzig, Samhain, Social Distortion, and briefly the Circle Jerks. He also laid down the drum tracks for Run-DMC’s Tougher Than Leather album.
In 1982, Chuck was a member of Black Flag—the greatest rock band/emotional malfunction ever—during a particularly intense period of their history. He recorded a scrapped version of their My War album that was never released officially due to the band’s crippling legal problems at that time. He did play live, including this blazing scene-stealing performance atop atop a shining drum riser at New York’s The Ritz in September 1982. Note that Chuck is wearing a fedora for about 10 seconds during the beginning of “Can’t Decide”!
I could easily be overlooking someone, but despite countless close calls I believe this is the first loss of a past member of Black Flag. R.I.P. and condolences to his peers and close persons, and he joins his deceased brother Dimwit from D.O.A.
UPDATE [6:45PM ET]: Only death is fake? Now the source of this news is recanting based on new evidence. Follow the mystery through the Internet if you dare… I’ll report back when the case is closed.
UPDATE [The next morning]: The moral of the story is that if you want to pull the wool over the eyes of the Internet, just invoke the name Chuck Biscuits and people will believe anything. Someone has been hoaxing Crawdaddy writer James Greene for six months, pretending to be the legendary hardcore drummer (with throat cancer, no less, so telephone calls would be impossible). Well, Chuck Biscuits’ brother drove to see him with his own eyes yesterday, and he ain’t dead yet.
Hope you enjoyed the video!
Sad news. First heard about it from your update on Twitter. Chuck was a huge inspiration when I was first learning to play drums in the late 80s at age 12. The first four Danzig records were favorites to play along to.
If this is the first Black Flag alumni obit, then I’m scared that means I’m getting old.
Also, I may be misreading the last line of your post, but if you’re sending condolences to Dimwit, you should know HE passed away in 1994 – heroin overdose.
WTF? NOW there’s stirrings that it’s all a hoax?
http://jgtwo.wordpress.com/2009/10/27/chuck-biscuits-1965-2009/
What the heck’s going on now? Has Chuck Biscuits become Schroedinger’s Punk? Ironic that the Youtube clip accompanying this entry is “Can’t Decide”. Do hope he’s still with us after all.
He lives.
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=301533790243&id=533851065&ref=nf