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“Dear Ricky, lovely man, played regularly in overalls and shirtless, nicest guy to ever play guitar.
Thanks for the memories and the songs.
Rest in peace forever, ”Iggy Pop wrote on his Twitter after learning of the death of Scottish guitarist Ricky Gardiner at the age of 73.
The news was given by Tony Visconti, famous producer and sound manager of
Low,
David Bowie's 1977 album in which Gardiner participated.
Visconti described him when he said goodbye to him as "a genius of the guitar".
Besides
Low
, Gardiner's other highlight was his appearance on Iggy Pop's album
Lust for Life,
also from 1977 and produced in part by Bowie himself.
The Scotsman was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease a few years ago.
On
Low,
Gardiner was responsible for the dark stabbing guitar licks.
The album is part of Bowie's famous Berlin Trilogy, which is completed by
Heroes
(1977) and
Lodger
(1979).
They are experimental works in which Bowie needed musicians without prejudice, with an open mind, capable of improvising and moving towards avant-garde sounds.
The British singer moved to the German city to get away from the hard drugs that threatened his mental and physical stability in the English and American environments where he moved.
Iggy Pop had similar problems.
Berlin was for both a liberating creative stage.
Gardiner was also the author of the trotting
riff
of
The Passenger,
sung by Iggy Pop, without a doubt the most popular piece in which the Scotsman participated and which belongs to the Pop album
Lust for Life.
It is Iggy Pop's most listened to song on Spotify, 284 million, and a fixture on the rundown lists of classic rock stations.
Both
The Passenger
and
Lust for Life
got a second life in the 1990s when they were included on the
Trainspotting soundtrack.
(nineteen ninety six).
In fact, many young people discovered them thanks to Danny Boyle's film.
Gardiner confessed that the composition occurred to him years before while he was walking quietly in the countryside.
And he filed it away in her brain.
“Iggy Pop and David Bowie were looking for material for
Lust for Life
in 1977. They asked me if I had anything and it really took me by surprise.
Then I remembered those guitar games that I came up with in the field.
Bowie liked them right away.
Iggy, however, was not very convinced.
But the next day he came up with a lyric and it all fell into place,” Gardiner described to
The Independent
about writing
The Passenger
.
Gardiner (born 1948 in Edinburgh, Scotland) was a self-taught musician.
He put together his first bands in the late sixties and had a progressive rock group of some relevance, Beggar's Opera.
He also participated in some recording of Tony Visconti.
He then came the trip to Berlin.
He participated in concerts for David Bowie and Iggy Pop in the late seventies.
When he started to start a family he decided to get away from the touring life.
A man little given to the privileges of the rock world, he worked as a session musician and set up his own recording studio.
The musician focused on music for meditation.
Together with his partner and his son, he made productions aimed at providing peace and space to develop reflections on oneself and the meaning of existence.
All focused on spirituality.
He died accompanied by his family.
