David Johansen, leader and singer of the New York Dolls, Punk Precursor Band and Glam icon, has died this Friday at age 75 at his home in his New York, as his daughter reported. Johansen had been with metastatic cancer, a brain tumor and a back fracture for years.
Johansen, who had turned 75 on January 8, was born in Staten Island in 1950 and joined the New York Dolls in 1971 with Arthur Kane, Billy Murcia, Johnny Thunders and Sylvain Sylvain. Two years later their debut would arrive, in which they already showed a very marked drag aesthetic. They came to launch two albums, but despite being acclaimed by critics, they received very little commercial success.
In 1976, the group separated and Johansen peristed a solo career, while continuing his work as an actor. At the end of the eighties he began using the name of Buster Poindexter, coming to act with the Saturday Night Live band. In 2004, the New York Dolls gathered thanks to Morrissey, big fan of the group, and threw another three albums. In 2023, Martin Scorses took Johansen to the big screen with the documentary ‘One night with David Johansen’.
