Alex Chilton, the singer and guitarist who had a No. 1 hit as a gravel-voiced teen with “The Letter” and went on to influence a generation of musicians through his work with Big Star, died Wednesday in New Orleans. He was 59.
The Memphis, Tenn., native died at a hospital after experiencing what appeared to be heart problems, said his longtime friend John Fry.
Chilton had his first taste of fame with the Box Tops, the band he and his friends started in Memphis. He was 16 but sounded much older when “The Letter” hit the top of the charts in 1967. Their other hits were “Soul Deep” and “Cry Like a Baby.”
It was Chilton’s work with a second Memphis band, Big Star, in the early 1970s that cemented his legacy as a pioneering voice for a generation of kids looking for something real in the glossy world of pop music.
The band was never a commercial success, but R.E.M. counted Chilton as an influence, the Replacements name-checked him with their 1987 song “Alex Chilton,” and his band still provides a template for musicians today.
“His versatility at soulful singing, pop rock songwriting, master of the folk idiom, and his delving into the avant garde, goes without equal,” Paul Westerberg, the former Replacements frontman, said in an e-mail. “He was also a hell of a guitar player and a great guy.”
In the 1980s and 1990s a generation of listeners looked to songs like “Thirteen,” “I’m in Love With a Girl” and “In the Street” (widely known as the theme song for “That ’70s Show”) because they perfectly captured teen angst and relayed sometimes-dark emotions that were universal.
“There was this feeling of yearning,” said Lou Barlow, a member of the bands Dinosaur Jr. and Sebadoh. “The songs were beautiful and the melodies were just almost like intuitive.”
Big Star’s three 1970s albums all earned spots on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest.
“Alex was an amazingly talented person, not just as a musician and vocalist and a songwriter, but he was intelligent and well-read and interested in a wide number of music genres,” said his friend Fry, the owner of Memphis-based Ardent Studios.
Chilton said in a 1987 interview he didn’t mind flying under the radar with Big Star and later as a solo artist.
“What would be ideal would be to make a ton of money and have nobody know about you,” he said. “Fame has a lot of baggage to carry around. I wouldn’t want to be like Bruce Springsteen. I don’t need that much money and wouldn’t want to have 20 bodyguards following me.”
Chilton had been scheduled to perform with Big Star on Saturday at the South by Southwest music festival in Austin, Texas. Original Big Star member Jody Stephens and Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer of the Posies plan to play Saturday’s show as scheduled in tribute.
Sadness over Chilton’s passing was felt all the way to Capitol Hill, where U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis said in the House: “He did it his own way, independent, iconoclastic, innovative. ... We’re lucky he came our way.”
