John Kezdy, the singer in Chicago punk band the Effigies, has died, experiences Streetsblog Chicago, citing the Cook dinner County Medical Examiner’s Workplace. In response to the report, Kezdy died on Saturday, August 26, from accidents sustained after crashing his bicycle right into a van stopped in a motorbike lane on Wednesday in Glencoe, Illinois. He was 64 years outdated.
Born in 1959, John F. Kezdy he was fast to fall in love with rock and punk as a child, as was his older brother, Pierre, who would go on to change into the bassist in Bare Raygun and Strike Beneath. John Kezdy thought-about himself to be a shy scholar whereas attending Evanston Township Excessive Faculty and the College of Wisconsin, however, after finishing one 12 months of faculty, he determined to hitch the Effigies as their boisterous lead singer. In response to Kezdy, he stepped as much as the place as a result of no person else was fascinated about doing so.
The Effigies shaped in 1980 with guitarist Earl Letiecq, bassist Paul Zamost, and drummer Steve Economou. They made a reputation for themselves in Chicago as one of many few native punk bands of the time, mixing collectively influences like Killing Joke, the Buzzcocks, and Intercourse Pistols for an effortlessly cool tackle punk and post-hardcore. With a melodic but energetic tone, Kezdy typically sang about native politics, hypocrisy, and corruption. Their debut EP, 1981’s Haunted City, helped popularize using the Chicago flag—which is partially displayed on the quilt artwork—as a signifier of cultural pleasure within the underground. They based their very own label, Ruthless Information, that very same 12 months.
“That first Intercourse Pistols report advised me to rise up and do it. I pumped fuel to save cash and dropped out of college as a result of I needed to be in a band,” Kezdy advised the Chicago Tribune in 1990. “Most bands are afraid to face up and say, ‘That is what I actually consider in.’ The true purpose to be in a band is to place your self in a neighborhood. And if not, to create one round you.”
After releasing one other EP in 1983 and their debut album, For Ever Grounded, in 1984, the Effigies sought a brand new guitarist, with Minor Menace’s Lyle Preslar inquiring about becoming a member of earlier than Robert O’Connor was employed. The band subsequently launched 1985’s Fly on a Wire and 1986’s Ink, each on main unbiased labels.
The Effigies broke up in 1990, however Kezdy reunited the group later that decade with a brand new lineup: guitarist Chris Bjorkland, bassist Tom Woods, and drummer Joe Haggerty. The band started taking part in reveals once more and would go on to launch the 1996 reside album V.M.Reside, in addition to a brand new studio album, 2007’s Reside, and the 2012 EP …On the Transfer, or in Hazard (Cease) This Will Have Been My Life (Cease). Kezdy additionally performed within the temporary band the Corrosives.