That's Entertainment!

Death of singer 24 tied to stage stunt:

Near the end of the show at Boston University on Thursday night, the 24-year-old Worcester resident performed his signature move [ed note: how about developing something a little more innocuous like the 'stop short' instead?]- howling into his microphone as he coiled the wire tighter and tighter around his neck.

But this time, the edgy flourish proved deadly. The pressure caused a clot in his jugular vein, later cutting off the flow of oxygen to his brain, according to his mother, band members, and friends. Mallary, an Emerson College graduate who counseled the homeless, died Friday afternoon at Boston Medical Center.

Hey homeless! Yes you there in the rags. Ol' JB will give you a little counseling: don't wrap wires around your neck and choke yourself! Granted, it may earn you a rep as an edgy flourisherer, but, you know, it can kill ya, so...

Senior Drill Instructor: Choke yourself Private Pyle! With my hand you numbnuts!

At least Michael Hutchence had a REASON for choking himself. I can admire that a lot more that some punk with a death wish making a post-modern spectacle of himself on stage.

RIP.

The Elder Chokes One Off:

I almost feel bad mocking a man's death, but since JB got the ball rolling...

"He put everything he had into every single performance," said Patrick Murphy, drummer in Mallary's band, Last Lights, and a close friend. "There aren't enough words to do him justice."

Somehow I think there are plenty.

"He was a Renaissance man," said his older sister, Elaine, who said a book of poems by John Merriman rested on his bedside table.

Galileo, Newton, da Vinci and now this guy who wrapped a microphone chord around his neck.

In the lyrics to "Love + Rent," posted on the band's MySpace page, Mallary wrote:

"There must be something human still left in this being/the lack of meaning is also a meaning/the lack of feeling is also a feeling/but don't press my face to the floor and call it a ceiling."

Berlin, Gershwin, Porter, and now Mallary. Another chapter added to the American songbook.