Mojo Nixon has left the building. He was 66.

Years ago, Mojo Nixon came into CFNY for a live interview. He was playing a club that night, at exactly the same time David Bowie was in town to play a stadium gig. I asked “Why should people comes see you instead of Bowie?” He pulled out a guitar and improvised a song on the spot, making his case. It was hilarious and brilliant.

In case you don’t remember, this was Mojo’s most enduring song from a 1987 album entitled Bo-Day-Shus!!!. It made it all the way to #187 on the Billboard Top 200 album chart.

To be fair, there was also this song which got quite a bit of alt-rock radio airplay. Don Henley once showed up drunk to a Mojo gig and demanded that he be allowed to sing onstage. Mojo recounted the night in an interview:  “He was shit-faced and he goes, ‘I want to sing that song, especially the part about not getting together with Glenn Frey!’” Nixon said. “He was beltin’ that shit out, screaming like he was Johnny fuckin’ Rotten.”

Mojo continued to play small gigs for a faithful following, six with sidekick Skid Roper and a bunch of his own. There were also at least a couple of movie appearances (Great Balls of Fire and Super Mario Bros). In 2022, there was a doc: The Mojo Manifesto: The Life and Times of Mojo Nixon.

Yesterday (February 7), he died of a “cardiac event” after performing during the Outlaw Country Cruise with his band The Toadliquors. Here’s the Facebook announcement.