Funk Singer Rick James Dies in Los Angeles

Celebrity Obituaries Forum

Man, this is... sudden. I don't want to be a jerk, but I can't help but be reminded of a certain quote from Rick James: "Cocaine is a hell of a drug."

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Funk Singer Rick James Dies in Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES - Funk singer Rick James, best known for the 1981 hit "Super Freak," died Friday, apparently of natural causes, police said.


AP Photo



James, 56, died at 9:45 a.m. at a residence near Universal City, said Officer Esther Reyes, a Police Department spokeswoman.


"He died apparently of natural causes. We learned of his death after responding to a radio call," Reyes said.


After his big hit, James' fame began to fade as he became embroiled in legal problems and health troubles.


James was convicted in 1993 of assaulting two women. The first attack occurred in 1991 when he restrained and burned a young woman with a hot pipe during a cocaine binge at his house in West Hollywood. He was free on bail when the second assault occurred in 1992 in James' hotel room.


James was sentenced to more than two years in state prison.


In 1997, he released a new album, but a year later he suffered a stroke while performing at Denver's Mammoth Events Center, derailing a comeback tour.


In 1998 he also underwent hip replacement surgery.


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-HECK!

Man, this is... sudden. I don't want to be a jerk, but I can't help but be reminded of a certain quote from Rick James: "Cocaine is a hell of a drug."

-----------
Funk Singer Rick James Dies in Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES - Funk singer Rick James, best known for the 1981 hit "Super Freak," died Friday, apparently of natural causes, police said.


AP Photo



James, 56, died at 9:45 a.m. at a residence near Universal City, said Officer Esther Reyes, a Police Department spokeswoman.


"He died apparently of natural causes. We learned of his death after responding to a radio call," Reyes said.


After his big hit, James' fame began to fade as he became embroiled in legal problems and health troubles.


James was convicted in 1993 of assaulting two women. The first attack occurred in 1991 when he restrained and burned a young woman with a hot pipe during a cocaine binge at his house in West Hollywood. He was free on bail when the second assault occurred in 1992 in James' hotel room.


James was sentenced to more than two years in state prison.


In 1997, he released a new album, but a year later he suffered a stroke while performing at Denver's Mammoth Events Center, derailing a comeback tour.


In 1998 he also underwent hip replacement surgery.


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-HECK!

Drugs weaken your heart. Sad for his family. He has young kids doesn't he?

Goodbye to 'Super Freak' - August 16, 2004

GRAMMY Award-winning funk singer Rick James has been laid to rest in his hometown, where 6,000 people waited for hours to pay their final respects.
The line of mourners in Buffalo, New York, stretched more than two blocks for the funeral service. Seventy gospel singers and a band performed a lively tribute.

"This Buffalo project boy was like a phoenix rising from ashes to the pinnacle of America's musical world," said his cousin, former Ohio congressman Louis Stokes.

He attended the funeral, along with the singer's three children, aunt, uncle, other cousins and friends.

The singer died in his sleep last week at his home near Universal City, California. James, whose real name was James Johnson Jr, was 56. He was to be cremated after the service, funeral director Vincent Amigone said.

An autopsy has failed to determine what caused the singer's death. Results of a toxicology test were pending. James, who suffered a stroke in 1998, was a diabetic and had a pacemaker.

James never failed to praise publicly his late mother, Mabel Sims Gladden, said Stokes, who described a mutual devotion between the hardworking mother and son.

"He took us all with him on a roller-coaster ride," said Stokes, whose brother, Carl Stokes, was elected the first black mayor of a major city, Cleveland, in 1967.

"Rick James became our family's first superstar."

James' 1981 hit Super Freak earned him a Grammy for best R&B song nearly a decade later, after rapper MC Hammer, who shared the Grammy, used it in his U Can't Touch This.

"He was without a doubt a musical genius," said longtime friend Aaron Dublin, who worked with James until 1983.

"He changed the game of music. There was never anybody like him before and there's never been anybody like him since."

The Associated Press

Rick James Autopsy Shocker

Rick James may have died of "natural causes," as his label announced the day after his death, but a Los Angeles county coroner's report released Thursday confirms the singer's last few days may have been anything but homeopathic.

The coroner's office officially ruled James' Aug. 6 death "accidental," but also noted that no fewer than nine drugs were found in his system, including methamphetamine and cocaine.

As E! exclusively reported Aug. 7, James was spotted just days prior to his death at a Hollywood party using cocaine, and many of his friends privately were concerned that the former "Superfreak" was back to his partying ways before his untimely death.

James and his family had maintained that James successfully kicked his cocaine habit, and that the R&B/Funk star was sober after years spent battling a crack addiction.

The "Give it to Me Baby" singer spent time in a Los Angeles jail during the mid 1990s for a crack-fueled assault in 1991, and had said in past interviews that his time behind bars had convinced him to stay clean.

In addition to cocaine and crystal meth, the Los Angeles county coroner's report noted the presence of seven other drugs found during the autopsy, specifically Xanax, Valium, Wellbutrin, Celexa, Digoxin, Chlorpheniramine and Vicodin. No single drug was found in quantities that would establish lethal quantities, hence the accidental death ruling.

The singer's official cause of death remains that of a heart attack, according to the coroner's office. The 56-year-old had been suffering from several health issues, including diabetes, a stroke in 1998 and heart-related problems in recent years.

James remains best-known for his 1981 hit "Superfreak." However, the Grammy winner was more than a one-hit wonder. He sold millions of records in the 1980s, and is widely credited for saving Motown records from bankruptcy with hit records like 1981's Street Songs.

James also wrote and produced songs for Teena Marie, Eddie Murphy, Mary Jane Girls, the Temptations and Smokey Robinson. He also licensed his work for sampling by artists such as Mary J. Blige and, famously, M.C. Hammer.

The R&B star's death came just as the 1980s legend was making a comeback of sorts. Comic Dave Chappelle's Chappelle's Show recently had introduced James' music, unmistakable swagger and funk-filled persona to a new, younger demographic via a particularly memorable skit on his Comedy Central show. James was also reportedly meeting with Paramount and several other studios to have his upcoming memoirs turned into a feature length film, with Chappelle in talks to star. The singer had also recently recorded more than 20 songs for a new album.

The beloved multi-instrumentalist received an all-star send off memorial service in Los Angeles Aug. 11 before being buried in his hometown of Buffalo two days later.

- E!

LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Flamboyant funk musician Rick James had nine drugs in his system when he died suddenly in August, including cocaine, methamphetamine, valium and vicodin, according to a coroner's report Thursday.

James, 56, died in his sleep on August 6 in his Los Angeles home of a heart attack, but the drugs in his system likely contributed to the organ's failure, the report said.

James, best known for his 1981 hit "Super Freak," suffered from diabetes, had a pacemaker and had been in fragile health after a stroke in 1998. He had been hooked on crack cocaine and once proclaimed himself an "icon of drug use and eroticism."

His family attributed his death to natural causes, but the Los Angeles County coroner took over the case because James had not seen a doctor in recent weeks. An autopsy failed to establish the cause and toxicology tests were ordered.

The coroner listed nine drugs, including prescription medications for anxiety, pain relief and heart failure, along with cocaine and methamphetamine that were found in James's body.

"None of the drugs or drug combinations were found to be at levels that were life-threatening in and of themselves," the report said. It gave the cause of death as a heart attack and ruled the death accidental.

James, who received a lifetime achievement award in June, had recently finished recording an album and was in talks with Hollywood studios for a movie about his life.