Recording Icon Kim Fowley Passes Away At Age 75

Celebrated American record producer, performer and musician Kim Fowley has died aged 75 after a protracted battle with bladder cancer.

The news has been confirmed on Twitter by Peer Music chief executive Ralph Peer, as well as Los Angelean music identity Harvey Kubernik.

The veteran producer had kept active even throughout his illness, recently collaborating with Sugar Mountain drawcard Ariel Pink on his Pom Pom LP, helping to pen five of the album's tracks. Well before that, though, Fowley was instrumental in the blossoming of the pop and rock scenes of the 1960s and '70s, a time during which he would come to prominence as the manager of The Runaways, featuring the iconic Joan Jett.

Fowley spent a tumultuous two years with The Runaways from 1975-77 before parting ways, as Billboard reports, "due in large part to his unorthodox work methods, mistreatment and verbal assaults". However, Fowley would reconcile with Runaways frontwoman Cherie Currie in 2008, when she invited the producer to stay at her home after news of his condition first came to light.

During his decades-long career, Fowley also worked as a producer or writer on tracks and albums such as Alice Cooper's Escape (1975), The Modern Lovers' 1981 self-titled full-length, The Seekers' Emerald City (1967), as well as songs such as At The Hop, Louie Louie and She's So Fine, and Helen Reddy's Ear Candy (1977), among several others. Amid it all, he navigated a long and storied solo career of his own.

In 2012, Fowley's films Golden Road To Nowhere and BlackRoomDoom won a special jury prize "for innovation and audaciousness" at the Melbourne Underground Film Festival, as well as finding the energy to appear in Beyonce's clip for Haunted.

Although it is widely known Fowley had been battling bladder cancer for years, according to Rolling Stone, no cause of death has yet been announced. Fowley is survived by his wife, music executive Kara Wright, whom he married in September last year.