Mick Farren

Michael Anthony Farren (3 September 1943 – 27 July 2013) was an English rock musician, singer, journalist, and author associated with counterculture and the UK underground, who had a significant influence on the development of British proto punk garage rock music.

Early life Farren was born in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, and after moving to Worthing, Sussex, attended Worthing High School for Boys, which was a state grammar school. In 1963, he moved to London, where he studied at Saint Martin's School of Art.

Music

Farren was the singer with the proto-punk garage rock R&B band The Deviants between 1967 and 1969, releasing three albums. During 1970 he released the solo album Mona – The Carnivorous Circus, which also featured Steve Peregrin Took, John Gustafson and Paul Buckmaster, before ending his music business to concentrate on writing. 1977 – Mick Farren and The Deviants – Screwed Up EP (Stiff Records) 1987 – Wayne Kramer & Mick Farren – Who Shot You Dutch? 199? – Lunar Malice – "Gunfire in the Night" / "Touched by the Fire"

Albums With The Deviants

Solo 1970 – Mona – The Carnivorous Circus (Transatlantic Records) 1978 – Vampires Stole My Lunch Money (Logo Records) 2005 – To the Masterlock – live (Captain Trip Records, Japan)

Other appearances 1991 – Wayne Kramer – Death Tongue (Progressive Records) 1993 – Tijuana Bible – Gringo Madness 1995 – Mick Farren and Jack Lancaster – The Deathray Tapes (Alive Records) 2013 – Mick Farren and Andy Colquhoun – Black Vinyl Dress

Compilations 1996 – Mick Farren and The Deviants – Fragments of Broken Probes 1996 – The Social Deviants – Garbage (Alive Records) 1999 – The Deviants – The Deviants Have Left the Planet 2000 – Mick Farren and The Deviants – This CD Is Condemned (Alive Records) 2001 – Mick Farren and The Deviants – On Your Knees, Earthlings (Alive Records)

Writing During the early 1970s he contributed to the UK underground press, including the International Times; he also established Nasty Tales, which he successfully defended from an obscenity charge. He later wrote for the mainstream New Musical Express, for which his work included the article "The Titanic Sails At Dawn", in which he considered the malaise afflicting then-contemporary rock music, and described the conditions that subsequently resulted in punk.

He wrote 23 novels, including the Victor Renquist novels and the DNA Cowboys sequence. His 1989 novel The Armageddon Crazy described a post-2000 United States dominated by fundamentalists who subvert the Constitution. He began writing fantasy literature in the 1970s. The cause of death was stated to be a heart attack.