I don't know his music too well or anything, but this type of thing is always saddening. Rest in peace.

http://pitchfork.com/news/38114-rip-sparkl...s-mark-linkous/

Yeah, that is really, really sad.

FUCK

Sparklehorse were often genius. sad deal

Damn.

One of my favorite records is It's A Wonderful Life. Godammit.

Yeah, likely to place well in the ATTD poll, even before this, incredible record

this is not a huge surprise but its still shocking.

fuck

Sad news. Sparklehorse had some good songs.

I always liked the dove cooing noises at the beginning of Gold Day.

is that Fennesz record any good?

Has its moments. Mostly ambient noodle. You'd want it if you were a Sparklehorse completist, some of it really wears his stamp. Its pretty good now I think about it.

Damn, what a tragedy. I was never a huge Sparklehorse fan, but I'll join the chorus of praise for It's a Wonderful Life. I was pretty into Sparklehorse back then, both because of that record and because artists I was a huge fan at the time of were fans/friends (Radiohead, PJ Harvey, etc). About a year before Elliott Smith died, a friend of mine who was really into him said "this sounds fucked up, but I give him a year". My response was that he was buying into the persona of Elliott Smith and the mythology that surrounded him; that humans were complex and just 'cause he seemed bummed out and wrote some downer songs didn't necessarily mean he would ever kill himself. I was so, so heartbroken and disappointed to be wrong about Elliott. Even when artists or famous people I'm not a fan of die, I sigh because somewhere some fan of theirs is gonna have such a shitty day and feel like they can't explain to friends/co-workers/family why someone they never met had such a profound effect on them.

wow, that's so sad. and coming straight off the back of the news that emi is finally releasing the album he made with danger mouse. such a waste / shame.

Which includes his collaboration with Vic Chesnutt - 'Grim augury'. You couldn't make this shit up.
http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2010...lehorses_m.html

Wow.
One of Montana's favorites as well.
Creepy that when I just went to his site he had a photo of Vic Chesnutt and a place to donate. I tried reentering the site but the photo doesn't come up again. Looks like Vic may have been inspiration. Sad.

Good Morning Spider is one of those albums that really got me into music. this is really tragic.

damn....

I was just listening to sparklehorse yesterday, and trying to turn two of my friends on to it. this makes me very sad

He was reportedly just finishing up a new lp for Anti.

MOTHERFUCKER.

I woke up to "Babies in the Sun" this morning. The guy wrote some beautiful music. A very underrated artist.

"It's a Wonderful Life" is one of my favorite albums of all time and easily a top ten of the 2k's for me.

Wow...I was really hoping this was just another fuckhead making a "RIP Chris Cornell" type thread. Really sad. Vic Chesnutt and now this? It's disturbing how common place suicide is in music.

All four of his records are quite good. I might have to play Good Morning Spider today if it doesn't bum me out too much. Hopefully that new one is completed enough that it'll be released without too much tinkering.

I seriously doubt its any more or less common than the general population at large. When some random depressed guy commits suicide it just dosent show up on the evening news.

And if there is a higher rate, I would imagine its because you truly do have to be a bit tortured inside to make great art.

God damn that guy wrote some great music. One of the few 90's artists who remained artistically viable(see Wilco as an opposite example).

He had a real knack for beautiful organic pieces of music. He's been on heavy rotaton for me since I picked up a copy of Good Morning Spied back in the 90's.

This really, really sucks.

Very few people wrote a ballad as beautiful as this:

very sad. i still need to really hear this dude, slogging through youtube clips now...

Only Montana could take an RIP thread about an artist he loved as an opportunity to take potshots at another band. Never change, you lovable bastard.

i remember the hype when good morning spider came out. it was one of those albums that everyone in music talked about, everyone interested in music had to hear, everyone who was fascinated by the simplicity yet incredible structures was absolutely astonished by.

he''ll be missed.

I still say the seque from "Box of Stars" to "Sunshine" is top ten all time. Good Morning Spider is such a haunting record. That's what this guy was- a dude who lived in the forest who crafted haunting woods music. He was wonderful and completely unique.

He was doing stuff that was very influential. People who like Stars of the Lid should run out and pick up Good Morning Spider. He blended that style with a woodsy psychedelic folk. Some examples:





This is just so beautiful:



Many of his songs came off as these timeless lullabies - perhaps something the world's most musically inclined mother would sing to her child.

None of his albums were product. He was a true artist in every sense of the word.

this one is his best record... one of my favorite lo-fi home recorded records of all time. i know every inch of this thing.

so glad i got the chance to see him at least once. he opened up for Mercury Rev at Metro sometime in the mid 90's.

I believe Linkous was also in a wheelchair for a time...from wikipedia.

Geezus...

the fuck.........

where did you hear that

fucking christ...unbelievable.

As much of a dick comment this is... is it wrong, now that I know it was suicide, to not care as much that he died?

Well, it's the classic "how could he not appreciate the awesome thing life is?" vs. "it must have been truly awful being in his brain, maybe he's at peace now" argument.

Usually I'm with the former when someone I don't know kills themselves, but for some reason Linkous's suicide has me feeling the latter, perhaps because his music so often dealt with depression and impermanence. He had tons of demons, and the demons won, and that's really sad.

RIP.

ive never gotten why people who commit suicide do it in fashions that will haunt the people they do it in front of for the rest of their lives...granted thats probably one of the last things theyre thinking of when they do it but geez...imagine being his friend and seeing him shoot himself in your yard...

I think it kind of is if you understand some of the science behind depression. His mental state and complete perception of reality told him life wasn't worth living. If he had hurt someone or tortured something, I wouldn't care. But he was a non-violent artist and a pretty cool guy from most accounts.

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/...-is-dead-at-47/

I understand that, but there's so many help programs out there for depression, especially among males. Maybe he tried them, I don't know, but my first thoughts with suicides aren't feeling sad for the person that died, but sad for the family and friends they left behind. There's be nothing worse than being a parent or a sibling of someone who committed suicide. I've had some experience in this and the mental anguish that it causes those left behind is beyond comprehension and often has a snowball effect.

The brother of a friend committed suicide around 1999, leaving his mother and my mate behind. Nothing seemed wrong with the guy, but he was battling depression and took his own life. This nearly killed his mother... the fact that she was alive and thinking every thought that she should've done more to help her son. She very nearly killed herself through distress, but didn't because she knew she had to look after her youngest son (my mate). My mate hung himself five years to the day of his brother's suicide and no-one saw it coming. I still hate him for it. Not only because his mother now has to deal with the fact that not only did her husband leave her to raise two boys by herself, but those two boys didn't see that there was help available and instead killed themselves.

I'm sorry Mark Linkous is dead, and it's sad as hell. But my sadness isn't for him at all, it's for those he would've left behind.

WOW

.

Depression is complex, even with the resources available, it can take years to really conquer.

I have to say, though, this is the first time in a long time (probably since Elliott, as UR alluded to) that an artist's death really felt like a punch to the stomach. It really hurt reading that headline.

It's weird. Today was our first day of filming of a movie about two people who are suicidal (only one of them is clinically depressed). We were prepping all day yesterday and I came home to see another musician killed himself. It's a sad state of affairs.

Well, at least his death gave you a chance to tell everyone you are filming a movie again.

hmmm....I wonder if you've mentioned the decline of wilco more than 4 times ever.

which, you know, isn't actually relevant to the discussion at hand, unlike a film that is about someone clinically depressed trying to fight through the urge to kill himself.

actually dicklick, I just searched on my name for "movie" and "film" and I only found one other time this year I mentioned filming a movie, and that was because I was trying to find that location.

Please shove it up your ass Monty.

thanks for 3 posts of bullshit in a thread about a great artist that has killed himself.

get fucked theremin.

fuck you, take it up with your friend montana.

Always sad to hear about this kind of thing, even though I never listened to Sparklehorse much.

Man, I knew this guy had issues, but I thought he was able to work them out during the last couple years. Good Morning Spider is playing as we speak...