RIP Duke Fakir

Duke Fakir of The Four Tops has sadly passed away just days after he announced he was retiring from the music industry aged 88. He was the last surviving original member of the group.

When getting into any genre of music, one thing I consider to be important is to learn about the roots. When I really got into R&B at the start of the 21st century it was generally accepted that a lot of it was owned to Motown. It was The Temptations who I got into initially but The Four Tops soon followed.

The first time I came across The Four Tops was as a young boy in 1988 when they did "Loco In Acapulco". I just assumed they were a modern group, but in reality this was the end of their new music output more or less. They were one of many big name Motown acts who were popular in the 60s and early 70s. They made a brief comeback in the early 80s and then again in the late 80s. Since then they've been touring regularly playing the old hits.

As mentioned, The Temptations were the first Motown group I properly learned about and one notable thing was the sheer quantity of members they've had over the years. I assumed it would be a similar story for The Four Tops but when I bought my first Four Tops CD I discovered their story was quite different. First of all they formed in 1953, before The Temptations or even before Motown existed. Secondly they kept the same line up for 44 years until the death of Lawrence Payton in 1997.

By this point Obie Benson had also passed away, whilst Levi Stubbs had retired due to ill health. The Four Tops continued to play with Duke Fakir being the only member and I went to see them in concert along with The Temptations.

There were 2 main criticisms that came my way when I told people I was going to see them in concert. First is that some people can't get their head around the fact it's possible to listen to music that was made before you were born. Secondly they would question whether it's a real Four Tops gig when there's only one original member yet.

If you went to one of these concerts though you'd find people of all sorts of ages there, and most if not all of them thoroughly enjoyed the performances.

Of course many of us would have preferred to see the classic line up, but this was the nearest it was going to get. Seeing a man in his 80s singing and dancing on stage and convincingly too was impressive.

It couldn't go on forever though given Duke Fakir's age, and now the time has sadly come. RIP Duke Fakir.