Jimmy Carl Black

A friend sent me a link the other day to a video of Jimmy Carl Black appearing on stage with Frank Zappa in the early ’80s in Albuquerque. I immediately set off in search of Black. Did he still live here in Albuquerque. (And by “set off in search”, I mean “Asked Dan Mayfield, who knows everyone.)

This morning, we have our answer:

Jimmy Carl Black, the original drummer in Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, a band that helped define the sub-genre of art rock, died of cancer Saturday. He was 70.

He died in Siegsdorf, Germany, according to Roddie Gilliard, who performed with Black in recent years as part of the Muffin Men, a British group that specialized in performing Zappa’s music live.