Goodbye, Scrapper

I didn't know Dave Marsh at all well and our collegial relationship had its bumps and scrapes — pugnacity was Dave's middle name — but like many others, I had and have unqualified respect for the man. Here's why, as I wrote about him over 20 years ago: "Marsh's main contribution [to rock criticism] was to never lose sight of who (by his lights) the music was for — not, or not only, the quick-witted undergrads turned on by Dylan or Uncle Lou, but the white and black teens at the crossroads of middle-class goodies and lumpenprole options that post-WWII affluence, combined with an unacknowledged class system, had put on the American map."

He had an underdog chip on his shoulder the size of a Thunderbird about snotty Ivy League refugees like me, which was -- in a paradox he might appreciate -- not totally deserved but completely justified. I thought his advocacy led him down some blind alleys (he never gave up on Billy Joel and Bob Seger and was belligerent about ignoring their faults as artists), but he had integrity and never-say-die passion like few writers in our uncomfortably shared wheelhouse could match. Godspeed.