Gil Scott-Heron passed away today in New York. He was only 62. Gil was a poet and musician, and he wrote songs in which you could feel anger, sadness, happiness, and fear, sometimes in the context of one album. Above is the cover of my favorite album of his, Pieces of a Man, just a wonderful album in which contained "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised", his biggest hit, but also contained some beautiful songs in which he sang (Gil rarely sang, and his vocals were usually of a spoken word style). Gil recovered from substance abuse over these past few years, and made somewhat of a comeback with I'm New Here. I feel guilty from the fact that I haven't followed his recent albums, and I wish I would've been following Gil's career recently. Gil Scott-Heron has been such a major influence on the hip hop community, but also the jazz and soul community as well. He was a major talent and will be dearly missed.
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