Along with Robert Hazard, whose obituary is here, I'd like to take a minute to remember another Philadelphia rocker, Christopher Tucker, the Brit-pop influenced songwriter who died on July 25. Ryan Cormier wrote about Tucker on his Pulp Culture blog here. Joey Sweeney at Philebrity, where Tucker was a contributor, paid tribute to him here. Royce Epstein at Philly Girl about Town wrote about him here.
I didn't really know him, but Tucker, who was 37 when he died, used to email me to keep me apprised of his doings with The Situation, who broke up in 2006, and his new band, Orphan Family, and he always seemed like a sweet prince of a guy. In June, we got to chatting about Coldplay, whose Viva La Vida he reviewed for Philebrity, making the excellent argument that it is pointless to compare U2 and Coldplay because "U2 is like a resurgent country. Coldplay is a more like a department store."
Tucker told me "I've recorded 35-40 songs in the last two years, solo, with just an m-box and a rode NTK1. .... I'm trying to figure out a way to post my entire catalogue on line for free." Some of those, including "Porcupine," which he, in a gross underestimation, thought was "pretty strong," can be heard on the Orphan Family MySpace page.
Tucker also explained there why the band was called Orphan Family: "because that’s what it feels like when you are with your best friends - you are orphans to each other, unrelated, but you are a family and that is a splendid dichotomy. the songs are about these things: devotion, f-, drugs, apathy, and the universal struggle between heart and mind. orphan familiy supports the definition of rock-n-roll, a phrase which initially got its name as a metaphor used to describe the way you rock and then you roll when you’re f- in the bushes. we’re all just a bunch of orphans."
In the video above, Tucker talks about, and sings, The Situation song "Latchkey Kids."
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