Jay Reatard dead

Thu 14th Jan, 2010 in International News

It has been confirmed that garage-punk musician Jay Reatard died in his sleep last night, aged 29.

According to Pitchfork Goner Records released a statement this morning that reads “It is with great sadness that we report the passing of our good friend Jay Reatard. Jay died in his sleep last night. We will pass along information about funeral arrangements when they are made public.”

Only last year Reatard, born Jimmy Lee Lindsey Jr, brought his band to Australia to play some of the most memorable sets at the St Jerome’s Laneway Festival.

In July of last year Reatard also released his second solo album, Watch Me Fall, which led our FL reviewer to write “Reatard isn’t sitting back on his laurels, satisfied with a relatively small cult following. He is moving forward, writing, recording and touring while the music and motivation is still burning bright. With songs this catchy he would be a chart-topping pop star in a parallel world. ”

His label Matador Records expressed their sorrow in statement that read , “Jay was as full of life as anyone we’ve ever met, and responsible for so many memorable moments as a person and artist. We’re honored to have known and worked with him, and we will miss him terribly.”

Whilst in Australia last year, Jay joined FL backstage at the Brisbane leg of Laneway to create one of the more unforgettable paintings from our Paint Like No-One’s Watching series. When playing his set, Jay got into a verbal stoush with a security guard who was roughing up kids trying to break the barrier as he played. In true Jay fashion he jumped off stage and ran into the crowd to show his support at the sets end. Straight after this incident Jay stormed over to us and whipped up a painting of a fat security guard with a name-tag that read – œDICK’. A picture really does say a thousand words.