Bugger! They're dropping like flies lately...
Andrew Gold, the man behind one of my favourite summer records ever, Never Let Her Slip Away, as well as the MOR standards Lonely Boy and Thank You For Being A Friend [later used as the theme to The Golden Girls], has died aged just 59.
One of of the mainstays of the mellow end of the pop music spectrum that prevailed when I was in my early teens in the 1970s, it came as no surprise to find out that Mr Gold was asked by Graham Gouldman to become a member of another fave classic songwriting and music combo 10CC (contractual difficulties prevented this happening), nor that he worked with the likes of Art Garfunkel, Jackson Browne, The Eagles, Eric Carmen and Cher.
Some things about Mr Gold's story did surprise me however:
- His mother was none other than Marni Nixon (the woman who dubbed Audrey Hepburn, Natalie Wood and Deborah Kerr in musicals of the 1950s and 60s). She survives him.
- One of his songs, Final Frontier, was used as a wake-up call for the Mars Pathfinder space probe in 1996.
- Surprisingly, Freddie Mercury provided backing harmonies on Never Let Her Slip Away.
Sublime...
RIP Andrew Maurice Gold (2nd August 1951 – 3rd June 2011)
