Ike Turner: Ike Turner, the musician who gave the world what many historians consider the first rock 'n' roll record - Rocket 88 in 1951 - but who bitterly acknowledged in his later years that he was most famous for being the abusive husband of Tina Turner, has died aged 76.
Turner's career spanned more than six decades and peaked in the late 1960s and early 1970s when he and his wife Tina were an incendiary force in R&B and live music, with hits such as Proud Mary, I Want to Take You Higher, Nutbush City Limits and River Deep Mountain High. The pair's dynamic revue took them well beyond the R&B scene in 1969 when they opened for the Rolling Stones on the British group's North American tour.
But while their stage show was engaging and feverish in its high-energy sexuality, the couple's backstage relationship was far darker. They split in 1976 and Ike Turner began a descent into a drug haze.
He became an obscure figure until 1986, when his ex-wife published her autobiography, I, Tina, which portrayed him as a volatile, drug-addicted brute who manipulated her, personally and professionally, and once broke her jaw.
Then came the 1993 film adaptation, What's Love Got to Do With It, which featured Laurence Fishburne in an Oscar-nominated portrayal of Ike Turner as a sullen and tyrannical husband. Angela Bassett won an Oscar for her role as Tina Turner, who had a huge career resurgence in the early 1980s, one that magnified the dramatically different life trajectories for the former spouses.
Ike Turner on numerous occasions said his former wife exaggerated the tales of abuse, but he also conceded that her accusations eventually defined him in the public mind.
"The problem is that there are two sides to every story and they only printed the bad side," Turner said in 1991 on the day he was released after an 18-month prison stay. He added: "I regret that I've screwed up my life but I'm not ashamed of nothing I did." A decade later, Turner expressed frustration that his musical legacy was not given its due outside of musician circles.
"You can go ask Snoop Dogg or Eminem, you can ask the Rolling Stones or Clapton, or you can ask anybody - anybody - they all know my contribution to music, but it hasn't been in print about what I've done or what I've contributed until now," he said in an interview.
But last year, he won a Grammy for best traditional blues album for Risin' With the Blues. In 2004, he also received the Recording Academy's Heroes Award.
"There is no doubt that Ike Turner was one of rock and roll's great architects with his genre-defying sound as an instrumentalist and bandleader," said Neil Portnow, president of the academy.
"His innovative musicality helped lay the foundation for rock 'n' roll and R&B more than 50 years ago. As a bandleader, his well-rehearsed ensembles were some of the most exciting live groups the world had ever heard."
Ike Turner was born November 5th, 1931, in Clarksdale, Mississippi, and his mother bought him his first piano at age nine. By 11, Turner was backing blues men such as Sonny Boy Williamson and Robert Nighthawk and soon started his own band, the Kings of Rhythm. In March 1951, he and his band caught some historic lightning in a bottle: Rocket 88, a song that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and many historians credit as the first rock 'n' roll record.
The song, a rollicking ode to the Oldsmobile 88 car, drew on jump blues and swing combo, and surged to No 1 on the R&B chart. The song was credited originally to an act that never really existed, Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats. It was the first of several perceived slights or missed career opportunities that stirred resentment in Turner.
The tandem of Ike and Tina began in St Louis. Ike Turner, by then a respected session player, bandleader and talent scout, had relocated there in 1956 and, playing the club scene, a leggy teenager named Anna Mae Bullock caught his eye. Turner and the woman who soon changed her name to Tina first recorded in the studio together in 1960.
By that summer they had their first hit, A Fool In Love, which they followed up with I Idolise You and It's Gonna Work Out Fine. Their signature song would be a fiery interpretation of Proud Mary, the swampy Creedence Clearwater Revival hit with Tina's memorable, husky spoken-word declaration that "We never, ever do nothin' nice and easy."
By several accounts, they were married in 1962, although other dates have been cited. In 1976, they split after an especially vicious fight that Tina Turner described in her memoir as the lone time she seriously fought back against her husband.
Ike Turner said on repeated occasions that he was married 13 times, Tina being his second wife. He is survived by at least four children: sons Ike jnr, Michael and Ronald and daughter Mia. (Tina Turner is Ronald's mother.)
In a 2001 interview, Ike Turner pointed to numerous photos of Tina among the career souvenirs that lined the walls of his den. "She was part of my life," he said softly. "No matter what happened, we were a team."
After his death this week, a representative of Tina Turner delivered a terse comment. "Tina is aware that Ike passed away earlier today. She has not had any contact with him in 35 years. No further comment will be made."
Ike Turner: Born Novermber 5th, 1931; died December 12th, 2007