Sky Saxon RIP

Sky Saxon, vox-ace and genius behind The Seeds has passed away. Sky's partner, Sabrina broke the next on Facebook saying "Sky has passed over and YaHoWha is waiting for him at the gate. He will soon be home with his Father. I'm so sorry I couldn't keep him here with us. More later. I'm sorry."

Saxon was in Salt Lake City, Utah and cut it through doo-wop and R&B groups before forming the The Seeds who gave us 'Can't Seem to Make You Mine' and the vicious brilliance of 'Pushin' Too Hard'. Saxon's vocals were always a weird, wonderful noise mixed with pained howls and finger waggin' sermonizing.

He broke up the Seeds in '67 to form the Sky Saxon Blues Band to release one LP, 'A Full Spoon of Seedy Blues' before reestablishing the Seeds. During the '70s he became a member of the Source Family religious group, a Hollywood Hills commune led by YaHoWha who gave Saxon the names Sunlight and Arlick.

The Seeds remain one of the finest examples of psychedelic garage punk from the '60s underground and every reader should go and pay tribute by listening to some Seeds at full tilt. [Mof]

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[Bleu French Laundry]

ROCKNROLL LEGEND SKY SAXON'S L.A. MEMORIAL WITH THE SEEDS' DARYL HOOPER & JAN SAVAGE, THE ELECTRIC PRUNES, STRAWBERRY ALARM CLOCK, BILLY CORGAN, NELS CLINE 07/24/09 ECHOPLEX OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

-- For Immediate Release --

- Los Angeles, California -

Richard Marsh, otherwise known to the rocknroll world as SKY SUNLIGHT SAXON, will find tribute & love visualized at a memorial in his honour to be held Friday, July 24th 2009 at the Echoplex in Los Angeles, California. At 8pm the service gathering will commence with performances by friends THE SEEDS' DARYL HOOPER & JAN SAVAGE with other members of SEEDS line-ups with Sky, THE ELECTRIC PRUNES, STRAWBERRY ALARM CLOCK's GEORGE BUNNEL - RANDY SEOL - MARK WEITZ - GENE GUNNELS, BILLY CORGAN of THE SMASHING PUMPKINS & MARK TULIN of THE ELECTRIC PRUNES one-night-only as SPIRITS IN THE SKY, NELS CLINE of WILCO, solo set by Djin Aquarian of YaHoWha 13, solo set by MIKE RANDLE of BABY LEMONADE (ARTHUR LEE'S LOVE back-up band), the Simon Stokes Band, Sofizel, & very special guests. Attendees are encouraged to dress in flower children ware & bring flowers for the stage.

The Echoplex is located at:
1154 Glendale Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
(213) 413-8200
http://www.attheecho.com/
The venue is 18 yrs & over
Advanced tickets available at Ticket Web

SKY SUNLIGHT SAXON of the psychedelic garage rock legends THE SEEDS passed away at 9:10am Thursday, June 25th, 2009 at St David's South Austin Hospital in Austin, Texas. Sky died of heart & kidney failure, due to an undiagnosed infection of his internal organs. He passed peacefully with his wife Sabrina Smith Saxon & his spiritual brother in YaHoWha Joshua Aquarian by his side. He died, in his words, at the age of "eternal".

SKY SUNLIGHT SAXON, fell ill as early as Thursday, June 18th in his new home in Austin. Despite feeling under the weather Saturday, he performed a short set of SEEDS classics at the local night club Antone's with his local collective WORLD SPIRITS, his favourite local Austin band SHAPES HAVE FANGS. After continuing illness, he was rushed to St David's South Austin Hospital Monday morning & was immediately placed in ICU. He remained in critical condition in ICU until his passing several days later. Sky & his wife Sabrina recently moved to Austin, following his exciting headlining performance at the Austin Psych Fest #2 in March. Several tours were scheduled, including the East Coast/Mid-West tour in August with the California Revue, with members of LOVE & THE ELECTRIC PRUNES. The tour will still continue despite his absence.

Sky had many projects in the works that will undoubtedly still be completed & released in the coming months if not years due to his wealth of creative material left behind. One of which is a documentary about his legendary band THE SEEDS to be released next year in 2010. The documentary chronicles the band's activities with exclusive interviews with all original members, & rare never-before-seen footage of the band live & in session. The project is spear-headed by Alec Palao of Ace Records U.K. (The Zombies' box set "Zombie Heaven") -

"Part of the impetus for the SEEDS documentary is to correct a lot of the misperceptions about the band," explains documentary-maker ALEC PALAO, "and to properly state their role and achievements, and celebrate their music for what it is. The band were way ahead of their time, which I realize more and more as I go thru the nuts and bolts of their recordings. Due to various circumstances beyond the band's control, the original integrity of what the band was doing got lumped in with the worst commercial hype of the psychedelic scene as it expanded. Ultimately it means that the hipsters and tastemakers got turned off by the hype, and those prejudices have remained with all the commentators and writers ever since. So THE DOORS remain hip and leaders and THE SEEDS are seen as commercial hippies, followers, or not even an authentic part of the initial movement, which of course is dead wrong. I'm doing my part to correct that!"

Learn more about SKY SUNLIGHT SAXON by visiting
these official sites:

http://www.skysaxon.com
http://www.myspace.com/theseeds

For inquiries, please contact:

Jennifer Marchand
Publicist :: Sky Sunlight Saxon
"Pushin' Too Hard" by THE SEEDS - Top 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Bleu French Laundry Rocknroll Promotions
Austin, Texas
bleufrenchlaundry@hotmail.com