After Singer’s Death, Gwar Will Carry on With Gwar-B-Q
The members of Gwar have decided to go forward with their annual “Gwar-B-Q” event this summer, following the death of frontman Dave Brockie – who performed as the alien Oderus Urungus – earlier this week. “As Dave and Oderus would have wanted,” reads a statement from the group’s manager, Jim Flanagan, the event will take place August 16th at Hadad’s Lake in Richmond, Virginia. Flanagan also announced a public memorial for Brockie on August 15th at the same location.
Rare Photos of Gwar’s Dave Brockie
The group is awaiting a toxicology report from the medical examiner to confirm the cause of Brockie’s death, a process that could take between one and three months. In the meantime, Brockie’s family has made funeral arrangements and has planned a private memorial open only to close friends and family.
Flanagan reported earlier this week that Brockie had died in the early evening of Sunday, March 23rd. A bandmate found his body at his home and alerted Richmond authorities. Foul play is not suspected in the death of the singer, who was 50.
Brockie’s bandmates and associates mourned the loss of the frontman in a segment on the Richmond CBS affiliate station WTVR. “Is he really gone? He’s really gone,” Davis Bradley, costume designer for the group, said. “One of the early ‘Gwar Girls’ said, ‘This is not the way the story goes. This is not the story.’ I felt the same way immediately. This is not the story – but it is the story.”
“Dave was an incredible artist, period,” musician Coby Batty said. “The guy had more energy and more artistic momentum than most people you’d ever meet in your life.”
“He’s the reason this thing was here this long, and in his memory hopefully we can keep it going,” said an uncredited Gwar staffer at a desk covered with the band’s costumes. “But I don’t know. That’s what he’d want, I’d suppose. He doesn’t want somebody to do a better job than him, that’s all.”