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Brian James, Founding Member of The Damned & Punk Rock Pioneer, Dead at 70

Brian James is dead, with The Damned founder and punk pioneer's family announcing that he died at 70 years old. Read about his life and career.

“A lovely bloke that I feel so lucky to have met all those years ago and for some reason chose me to help in his quest for the music revolution that became known as punk,” he added. After leaving The Damned, James would form short-lived group Tanz Der Youth before starting The Lords of the New Church with Stiv Bators. Five years prior, his former bandmates emphasized how important he’d been not only to the band, but to developing the English punk scene, in a 2017 interview with Rolling Stone.

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