Comedian George Carlin died of heart failure at a Los Angeles-area hospital on Sunday. He was 71. Carlin was celebrated as a counter-culture icon for his provocative anti-establishment material in the 70s, particularly the routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television." A live performance of the obscenity laden bit saw him arrested in Milwaukee in 1972 for disturbing the peace, and a radio broadcast of the routine in 1973 brought the ire of the FCC upon a New York City radio station. The resulting legal battle went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978. Amid the controversy Carlin's became the first person to host television comedy institution Saturday Night Live.

Carlin's humor and commentary remained consistently critical of modern American life, taking a nihilistic slant that resonated to this day. In a 2001 Reuters interview he commented "I don't have any beliefs or allegiances. I don't believe in this country, I don't believe in religion, or a god, and I don't believe in all these man-made institutional ideas." Carlin's career spawned 23 comedy albums, 14 HBO specials, three books, and numerous TV and movie appearances. He was slated to receive the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor later this year.

Carlin is survived by his wife Sally Wade, and daughter Kelly Carlin McCall. Our deepest condolences go out to his family, friends and fans.

Pioneering blues and rock'n'roll musician Bo Diddley has passed away due to heart failure. Diddley was born Ellas Bates McDaniel in McComb, Mississippi. He was inducted into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame in January 1987 and proved influential particularly for his role in bridging the gap between blues and rock and roll.

His music had been covered by a diverse range of artists including Elvis Presley, The Doors, The Stooges, The Clash, Johnny Thunders, The Rolliing Stones and The Jesus and Mary Chain. Both the New York Dolls and The Lurkers recorded their own version of his song "Pills", and Diddley was the opening act on The Clash's first U.S. tour.

Our deepest condolences go out to his family and friends.

Dub reggae legend Mikey Dread passed away this Saturday. He was 54. The influential musician and produer was diagnosted with a brain tumor half a year ago.

Dread, born Michael Campbell in Port Antonio, Jamaica, first made waves as the host of the overnight JBC radio show Dread At The Controls. The pioneering show was the first Jamaican radio program to focus on then-underground reggae music. Dread championed the cause by playing artists like King Tubby, Augustus Pablo and Linval Thompson, none of which could otherwise be heard on the conservatively run station. Moving into producion Dread was a vital contributor to the Clash, producing their "Bank Robber" single and co-producing the Sandinista! full length. While in the UK he narrated a six-part series on Jamaican culture for the BBC entitled Deep Roots Music. The early 80s also gave rise to important solo full lengths such as `81's Beyond World War 3 and `84's Pave The Way.

Mikey Dread is survived by his wife Monika and six children. Our deepest condolences go out to his family and friends.

Gary Gygax, one of the key creators for the popular role playing game Dungeons and Dragons, passed away in his home on Tuesday morning at the age of 69. He had been battling various health issues for years, including an abdominal aneurysm. Dungeons and Dragons was created in 1974 with Dave Arneson, and has served as the standard in role playing games ever since, inspiring numerous video games directly and in-directed based off of the system. It has also served as a tool of inspiration for many bands, helping develop a fascination with the fantasy world that sometimes extends to a group's lyrical endeavors. Gary was also a prolific writer and a figurehead of the role-playing community, even playing a cartoon version of himself once on the cartoon Futurama. He will be missed by many.

Punknews.org sends our condolences and best wishes to his friends and family.

Mike Conley, former vocalist of Orange County punk band MIA was found dead yesterday in Chicago. According to the news report, Mike was found unresponsive at 5:40 a.m. by a person staying in the hotel in the 2300 block of North Mannheim Road, sheriff's police spokeswoman Penny Mateck said. He appeared to have suffered head injuries.

All Music Guide called M.I.A. "one of the 50 best So-Cal punk bands of the great early-'80s second wave explosion."

Our condolences to Mike's friends and family.

10 people were killed and dozens injured after a stampede broke out at a metal concert in Bandung, Indonesia. The show took place Saturday night and featured local band Beside. Doctors are reporting that most of the deceased were teenagers who were trampled during the stampede at a club which some say was filled over capacity, although no official reports have been made.

Our deepest condolences to the friends and family of the deceased.

Dischord Records is reporting the sad news that drummer Sean Finnegan of Void passed away on Wednesday January 30th from an apparent heart attack. Sean played with the early hardcore act while the band was active from 1980 to 1983, and was most recently working on the set of HBO show The Wire.

Sean's family will receive friends today from 2 to 5 and 7 to 9 PM at Harry H. Witzke's Family Funeral Home in Ellicott City, Maryland. In lieu of flowers his family ask that donations may be made to the Fisher House at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, D.C.

Our deepest condolences to Sean's friends and family.

Mike Park has passed on some sad news about his former band mate from Skankin’ Pickle, Lynette Knackstedt:

Lynette Knackstedt passed away on Friday, December 7th, 2008. We went to middle school, high school, and spent 7 of our adult years together in Skankin' Pickle. She was only 37 years old.

Lynette was the much loved guitarist of the San Francisco based sextet. After the break up of the Pickle in 1996, Knackstedt and trombonist Lars Nylander went on to form the 78 RPMs.

Our deepest condolences to Lynette's friends and family.

Arsonists Get All The Girls' bassist Pat Mason has passed away on the night of his 21st birthday. The band has posted the following message on MySpace:

We can't describe the pain and sorrow that we all are feeling right now. Last night/early this morning our bassist, Pat Mason, passed away. Pat was an amazing person and brother to all of us. It was his 21st birthday and we all got to see him at band practice. He then proceeded to go out to the bars. He went to sleep at a friend's house. We don't know the full details but when friends tried to wake him up this morning he didn't wake up. We could never trade him for the world and could never replace him. We will always love him and will always be in our hearts. We are going to continue with the band cause that is what Pat would have wanted. There will be a donation account set up soon for his family and possibly a local benefit show as well. Thanks for everyone for the support that the band has since the beginning. We love you all and Pat loves you all as well.

Punknews.org sends our condolences and best wishes to his bandmates and family.

Dayton, Ohio's Hawthorne Heights has announced the sad news that rhythm guitarist Casey Calvert has passed away. He was 26. The band made the following announcement:

Today is probably the worst day ever. Its with our deepest regrets that we have to write this. Casey Calvert passed away in his sleep last night. We found out this afternoon before sound-check. We've spent the entire day trying to come to grips with this and figure out as much as possible. At this time we're not sure what exactly happened. Just last night he was joking around with everyone before he went to bed. We can say with absolute certainty that he was not doing anything illegal. Please, out of respect to Casey and his family, don't contribute or succumb to any gossip you may hear. We don't want his memory to be tainted in the least. Casey was our best friend. He was quirky and awesome and there will truly be no others like him! His loss is unexplainable. As soon as we know more we will let you know.

The band last released If Only You Were Lonely in 2006.

Our deepest condolences to Casey's friends and family.

Drummer Witold "Vitek" Kiełtyka of Poland-based hardcore/tech/metal act Decapitated has passed away. On October 29, 2007, while travelling to a show in Gomel, Belarus, Decapitated was involved in a bus accident. Their tour bus collided with a truck carrying wood, giving serious head injuries to Vitek and Adrian Kowanek.

Decapitated formed in 1996 in Krosno in southern Poland, when the average age of the band was fourteen and all the members were still attending music school. The band released their last album, Organic Hallucinosis in 2006 via Earache.

Our condolences to Witold's friends and family.

Linda Stein, former manager to the Ramones and ex-wife of Seymour Stein, president of Sire Records, was killed in a shocking and senseless murder yesterday. Stein, a former schoolteacher co-managed the Ramones during the band's heyday. She's credited with bringing the Ramones to England for their infamous July 4, 1976, show. That performance is often described as the catalyst for the punk movement in Britain. After Stein and Fields parted ways with the Ramones in 1980, she eventually launched a real estate career brokering multimillion-dollar Manhattan apartments for rock and roll royalty.

Stein's daughter found her body Tuesday night face down in the living room of the apartment, located in a doorman building on Fifth Avenue where she lived alone. There were no signs of a break-in or robbery, and police said they had no motive or suspects. An autopsy found that Stein, 62, died from blows to the head and neck.

Our deepest condolences to Linda's friends and family.

Paul Fox, best known as the guitarist of influential reggae punks, The Ruts, has passed away at 56 following a battle with lung cancer. Just this past summer, Fox performed with the surviving members of the Ruts and fronted by Henry Rollins.

Formed in the late 70s, the Ruts were among the first wave of British punk bands, taking influence from reggae and punk rock and being active in the early anti-racist movement. Though the Ruts were no longer performing, Paul remained active in music, performing with the Dubcats.

Our condolences to Paul's friends, family and fans.

Founding member of J Church and all around well-loved punk icon Lance Hahn has passed away. Hahn had been comatose since Friday, October 12th following a collapse during dialysis. According to a post attributed to Hahn's girlfriend:

as far as the doctors can tell, this collapse was due to a sudden, drastic drop in blood pressure, which in turn was probably caused by a recurrence of the infection he had had in september combined with the stress of dialysis. he received immediate cpr from medical professionals at the dialysis center, but as it took fifteen or twenty minutes to resuscitate him, he suffered neurological damage from lack of oxygen to the brain, leaving him in a coma from which he never returned.

Lance Hahn was the lead singer, guitarist, and founding member of J Church. He also wrote extensive "punk rock history" articles for Maximumrocknroll. In addition of all of this, he found time to run Honey Bear Records. Hahn was working on a compliation book of writings on anarcho-punk bands, called "Let the Tribe Increase," to be released on AK Press.

All of us at Punknews.org extend our deepest condolences to Hahn's friends and family.

Paul Raven, bassist behind influential post-punk/industrial outfit Killing Joke has died of an apparent heart attack.

The 46 year-old was the second bassist in Killing Joke and remained with the band until their first break up in 1991. After that, he performed with both Prong and Godflesh and later collaborated with Ministry for their 2006 full length, Rio Grande Blood.

Killing Joke keyboardist Rez Udhin told one media outlet:

Paul was a very amazing man who I loved and trusted very much. He always had great ideas, ventures and always looked out for me as if I were a little brother to him.

"I was very fortunate to be in contact with him several times in his last week and I had great conversations with him, we laughed and joked, which was an integral part of his personality. "Paul will be greatly missed by music fans, friends and mostly his family; his bands will miss him terribly. He was a great man and a unique bass player who has died at such a tragically early age.

Ministry's Al Jourgenson also commented:

I am in total shock. The world of music is a sadder, emptier place. Not only was Raven an extraordinary talent, but one of my closest dearest friends. Our condolences and prayers go to his immediate family. He will be truly missed by artists, musicians and his fans the world over.

Our condolences to his friends and family.