Negativland Former Member Ian Allen Has Died

Negativland Former Member Ian Allen Has Died

Photo via Negativland’s Facebook

Negativland member Ian Allen, who was active in the multi-media group between 1981 and 1987, has died. He was 56. He died on January 17 following complications from heart valve surgery at California’s Stanford Hospital, the band wrote in a Facebook post, as Boing Boing points out. “We are extremely shocked and saddened by this news,” they write.

The Facebook post continues, “His impact, inspiration, and influence on the group is impossible to overestimate. There would be no group as we know it today, no Over The Edge radio show, no ‘culture jamming’ and no A Big 10-8 Place LP without him.”

In the early ’80s, Allen introduced the technique of tape splicing to the band, and pushed their albums in a more conceptual direction. He left the band because of recurring health problems, but remained a supporter over the years. Recently, the band incorporated “Like Cattle Act”, an unfinished loop made by Allen in the ’80s, into their current live set.

“For those who knew him, he was a visionary, magical, impish, playful and eccentric thinker, a true genius who was light years ahead of all of us with his ideas about art, sound, society, and technology,” the band writes. “He will be dearly missed.”

Read the full note here.

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