If you know in your mind that this life is going to be taken from you, very soon, oh, man! I just had so many deep feelings of being. I mean, you see things really intensely and you actually realize you’re alive. “But, certainly, during the year that I was dying, well, it was great. I just believed I’d return to the oblivion I came from!” Johnson said with a hearty laugh. “Well, first and foremost, I’m an atheist, so I never had to reflect about that. He has not, however, grown more spiritual after somehow cheating death (about which more in a moment). But it had exactly the opposite effect on Johnson, who - against immense odds - is still alive, if not yet completely well, and looking forward to celebrating his 68th birthday in July. The prospect of imminent death might cause most people to plunge into depression. And they said: ‘You’ve got pancreatic cancer and about 10 months to live’.” Eventually, my son forced me to go to the hospital. “I was treating it by ignoring it and hoping it would go away. “I had this tumor in my stomach that you could see it’s about the size of a fist,” Johnson recalled, speaking by phone in late December from his London home. The life-and-nearly-death sequence of events that ensued was more surreal than any TV script writer could dream up. In this case, “farewell” took on a decidedly ominous tone. The hulking Johnson, whose bald head and perpetual scowl were perfectly suited to his role as executioner Ilyn Payne on “Game of Thrones,” then mounted a farewell concert tour in his homeland. Feelgood, the pioneering band the veteran guitarist co-led in the 1970s. The Who singer was a longtime fan of Johnson’s solo work and of Dr. Instead, he quickly recorded “Going Back Home,” his wonderfully raw and gritty joint album with Roger Daltrey. After being told he had less than a year to live, he opted not to undergo chemo therapy or any other treatment. In early 2013, the English rock guitar legend disclosed he had been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. ‘Game of Thrones’ executioner beats deathĪfter being diagnosed with terminal cancer, legendary English rock guitarist (and periodic actor) Wilko Johnson made an album with Who singer Roger Daltrey and prepared to dieĪfter playing the role of an executioner during the first two seasons of the acclaimed HBO TV series “Game of Thrones,” Wilko Johnson received a real-life death sentence. Here is Johnson’s complete 2015 San Diego Union-Tribune interview. I’m still trying to get used to the idea that my history now extends a little further than Christmas time.” “Now, when someone talks to me about doing something in six months time, I can’t take it in. “I spent this (past) year thinking my life was measured in months,” he said in his 2015 Union-Tribune interview. His memoir, “Don’t You Leave Me Here: My Life by Wilko Johnson” was published in 2016. Johnson performed in London as recently as last month. (Johnny) Rotten, (Joe) Strummer and (Paul) Weller learned a lot from his edgy demeanor. “His guitar playing was angry and angular, but his presence - twitchy, confrontational, out of control - was something we’d never beheld before in UK pop. “Wilko Johnson was a precursor of punk,” Bragg wrote. Singer-songwriter Billy Bragg sang Johnson’s praises Wednesday in a Twitter post. His music lives on but there’s no escaping the final curtain this time.” In a post on The Who’s website on Wednesday, Daltrey wrote of Johnson: “I was lucky to have known him and have him as a friend. And people are coming in, and saying: ‘The record’s selling really good!’ ” Then, the next year, there I am - lying in the hospital - with morphine drips and all these tubes going into me. I was very pleased with the result, although I thought I’d be dead when the record came out. “I said to him: ‘We better do this really quick.’ We recorded it in 8 days. “I thought the record with Roger was the last thing I’d ever do,” Johnson said in his 2015 Union-Tribune interview. His band served as a vital link between pub-rock and punk-rock and his death inspired online tributes by such varied musicians as Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Kapranos and Who singer Roger Daltrey, with whom Johnson recorded the bluesy album “Going Back Home” in 2014. Not so in England, where his intensely rhythmic, slash-and-burn guitar style as the co-leader of Dr.
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