Dead Celebrities of 2008: Men
Last time on YouTube Digger, we looked at three of the notable females who passed away in the past year. As you’ve probably guessed from the title of this post, we are now going to look at three men who shuffled off this mortal coil in this past year. No offence to the spirits of all of the other men who’ve passed away in 2008 who I don’t mention. I just have enough room in the post for three. So there.
First up is Ellas Otha Bates, better known as Bo Diddley, who passed away on June 2 of this year. He was one of the most influential personas in pop music, so much so that he was nicknamed “The Originator”. Thankfully, unlike a lot of black musicians of the early twentieth century, Bo Diddley did receive the recognition he deserved. I always loved the square guitar.
Next up was a guy who I thought would live forever — Paul Newman. Although best known for being a movie actor (that’s always good for the career), he also managed to give a lot of money to charity through his unique food line and his daughter’s food line, Newman’s Organics. I never did understand his fascination for car racing, but then again, I’m not a guy. It’s hard to narrow down a celebrity’s life in just one YouTube clip, but perhaps this bit from “Cool Hand Luke” is as good as any. Paul Newman sings “Plastic Jesus”. I do not know who played the banjo:
And now, the death that I will never get over, that of legendary comic, truthteller and linguist, George Carlin. He had a real way of playing with words and getting into their true meanings that I will always admire. That, and no one else in the world could swear as humorously as he did. Not everything he did was funny, but most of it gave me a good laugh, even years later when I knew the punchline of the joke. As I was starting narrowing down this list to three, I at first completely forgot that George had died — because part of me still hopes that he’s alive. Here he is in a post put up by a fellow comedian, Boy Howdy. Appropriately, this bit is about death, done a couple of years ago:
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