Rip< Chris Gaffney

[Wild Bill]

If you don't know who Chris Gaffney was, maybe you are a fan of Dave Alvin or The Blasters. Gaff was Dave's best friend in the world. I'm a huge Dave Alvin fan, so this is very sad news.

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O.C. music community remembers Chris Gaffney

Obituary: The singer-songwriter, who died of liver cancer at 57, touched people with his songs and personality.

 

By PETER LARSEN

The Orange County Register

 

Chris Gaffney, the Orange County singer-songwriter whose country and roots rock-tinged music earned him a small but fervent following in barrooms and concert halls around the world, died Thursday after a brief battle with liver cancer. He was 57.

 

For years, Gaffney gigged constantly around Orange and Los Angeles counties, playing the Swallow's Inn in San Juan Capistrano with his band the Cold Hard Facts on a Saturday night, then moving up the highway to the Blue Café in Long Beach for a show on Sunday afternoon.

 

While he might not have found the fame his fans – including many fellow musicians – felt he deserved, in recent years, as part of the Hacienda Brothers band, Gaffney expanded his touring beyond Orange County, to cities around the nation and in Europe.

 

"In a lot of ways, he was the sort of guy who music critics dream of walking into a bar and finding their whole lives," said Jim Washburn, a former Register pop music critic who befriended Gaffney and say him play scores of shows. "Someone who's just there and is undiscovered and phenomenal.

 

"It gets kind of grating when the decades pass and he's still undiscovered, but that was also part of Chris' charm," Washburn said. "On any night, you could go into a bar in Orange County and see one of the best shows you'd ever seen in your life."

 

His knowledge of music was seemingly unlimited. Though he specialized in what today might be called alt-country or roots rock, he knew, loved or played everything from Duke Ellington to Louis Prima, Porter Wagoner to the Specials.

 

"I met him in the early '80s, in a bar, where he was in the band," said Julie Gaffney, with whom he would have celebrated 25 years of marriage next month. "He was the guy I knew I needed to be with all of my life – and all of his."

 

She said his music was what attracted fans to his shows, but his personality is what turned fans into friends.

 

"He was genuine, and he was also just a really funny guy, who could talk to anybody about anything," Gaffney said. "When he played and I was with him, he never even came and talked to me, because he always went out to talk to people at the show."

 

His music, like his personality, was the real deal: down to earth, honest, and grounded that part of America where hard-working people gathered to sing songs about life and share a beer or two.

 

"I think he does the country best," Julie Gaffney said. "The George Jones – I loved when he used to sing 'He Stopped Loving Her Today' – and 'The Cold, Hard Facts of Life' by Porter Wagoner.

 

Last year, in Nashville for a tribute to the late Wagoner, Gaffney sang that song on stage, alone with his acoustic guitar, she said. "And it brought down the house.

 

"You could tell that that was what he really liked to do – and he was lucky he got to do it."

 

His illness was diagnosed earlier this year, and the cancer attacked him aggressively. As news of his death filtered out into the world of those who knew him, friends – including fellow singer-songwriters Dave Alvin and Jim Lauderdale – started calling the house to express their condolences, Julie Gaffney said.

 

Walter Clevenger, whose band the Dairy Kings now includes former Cold Hart Facts' keyboard player Wyman Reese – says he spent Sundays at the Blue Café for a few years, soaking up the cheap Dixie beer and the inspiring Gaffney music week after week.

 

"It was pretty much a religious experience for me," Clevenger said.

 

Later, Gaffney played accordion on a few songs for one of Clevenger's albums, and he and the Dairy Kings returned the favor for a song Gaffney later recorded. Those kinds of collaboration were a constant in Gaffney's career, with close friend Alvin a frequent partner in songwriting and touring.

 

Fundraising efforts to help with his medical costs include a tribute CD with musicians such as Clevenger, Lauderdale and Rosie Flores covering Gaffney songs. A concert at the Doll Hut in Anaheim was scheduled for April 27; details on its status now were not available Thursday night.

 

A Web site – www.helpgaff.com– also had been set up to help with expenses, and will continue to do so to help the Gaffney family medical and other bills, Washburn said.

 

Gaffney is also survived by Erika Gaffney, a daughter from a previous marriage. Services are pending, Julie Gaffney said, with a memorial to be planned to celebrate his life and music.

 

"We need to have something," she said. "There's going to be a lot of people who are going to want to come and say goodbye."

 

 

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Photos taken by a friend of mine:

 

Gaff on accordion with The Hacienda Brothers:

 

Gaff (r.) on guitar with The Hacienda Brothers:

 

Dave Alvin, Greg Boaz and Chris Gaffney (part of Dave's band, The Guilty Men):

[ceemonster]

this is very sad news indeed. i grew up in southeast los angeles, two towns east (and a couple of degrees lower on the socioeco demo scale) from downey, home of dave alvin and his brother phil, who were like idealized older-brother music & culture heroes to my own sibling and i. i am a huge blasters fan, have seen and continue to see shows by both brothers, and own many blasters lps, and solo lps by both brothers....i read within the last month or so that mr. gaffney was ill and a benefit was being organized to try to raise money for his medical care. so sorry to read this latest news. i saw him playing with dave at hollywood's amoeba records within the last year or so, just after dave's recording of covers of california songwriters came out.....RIP, mr. gaffney.

Edited April 18, 2008 by ceemonster