RIP Ron Asheton.

It's probably not news to you, but Deming just filled me in a few moments ago ... Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton was found dead in his Ann Arbor, MI home at age 60. I usually don't feel much when a celebrity dies (other than morbid interest), but this one really hurts. I can't overstate my devotion to the Stooges, not Iggy, but the Stooges. Every note of those first two LPs is carved deep inside me, particularly Funhouse, an amazing, sprawling album, the purest example of "rock" music ever recorded.

It’s not as well known as his tenure with the Stooges, but Asheton was also a lifelong horror film fanatic who appeared in a number of outrageous low budget splatter features. I’ve seen almost all of them (Mosquito is the best). And I just realized that I’m wearing a Stooges t-shirt today … I gotta take a minute, I’ll be back later.

LATER: To continue ...

I only saw Asheton perform once. It was shortly after Fred Sonic Smith died ... Patti Smith did a gig in Ann Arbor that ended up a revolving door of guest appearances from Michigan rock confidantes like Scott Morgan, Gary Rasmussen and Hiawatha. I have great respect for these guys and their lifetime batting averages, but I was there to see Patti Smith, and had "And Friends" been included on the ticket then I might actually have thought twice. It was like being at a wake for someone I didn't really know, had never actually met, and I even felt a little guilty. Anyhow, at one point some corndog in a white suit got on stage with an acoustic guitar and did a song with Patti which I politely endured -- it wasn't until she introduced him afterward that I realized that weird old guy was Ron Asheton, whose records I listened to on a nearly-daily basis at that point in time. Patti Smith burst into tears on and off throughout the show -- either she just wasn't ready to deal with her grief publicly yet, or this was the only way she could do it -- so it was a strange evening over all.

I hope we can expect deluxe DVD reissues of Asheton's filmography now that he's gone. Like I suggested earlier, Mosquito is the greatest of Ron Asheton films, and certainly his best performance. He's a simple-minded park ranger who bands together with other survivors in an all-out war against giant mutated mosquitos -- fast moving, decent special effects, a very Michigan mise en scene and also features Mike Hard as a survivalist and Margaret Doll Rod as an anonymous topless victim.

Don't be afraid of Legion of the Night, either ... it's mostly an action film with some sci-fi zombie edges and looks as cheap as it is, but Asheton is lots of fun to watch as a bitter lab assistant who helps a murdered scientist's son get revenge on the mob with a makeshift army of undead assassins. He spends most of his time onscreen nervously sucking on cigarettes, as if that was the only "motivation" the director had given him.

So fuck it, Ron Asheton is dead.

ONE MORE THING ... I just started digging into this last weekend (Jesus, is it my fault?) -- the Complete Funhouse Sessions boxset, and if there's ever a day it's appropriate to listen to 28 versions of "Loose," today's the day. There's no one take of any song that betters what they ended up with on the official release, but each track features one more blazing lighter fluid fuzz solo from our fallen hero, and like snowflakes, no two are ever exactly alike.