The former guitarist to heavy metal icon Alice Cooper has died on the morning of Wednesday 30th July. At the age of 71, Dick Wagner had spent the last couple of weeks at healthcare facility in Scottsdale Health Care Shea Medical Centre in Scottsdale, AZ. Following a cardiac procedure and had to be in intensive care. An influential guitarist not only in Alice Cooper’s career but all over the rock world, having worked briefly with Aerosmith as well as the shock horror main man.

On Wagner’s website there has been a small press release detailing the unfortunate circumstances.

“It is with a heavy heart and great sorrow we have to let you know that Dick Wagner has left this world.

“Dick had a huge heart, which is perhaps why it gave him so much trouble; it was simply too full of love, of music and life.

“His creativity and passion will live on forever in the legacy he has left for us, in his music and his words.

“We have so much of him to celebrate.

“Dick was prolific not only in the tangible realm of what we can see and hear but in the boundless energy of his spirit, which will never die. He was a fighter, but in the end his body couldn’t keep up with his spirit, and so he lays to rest.

“Dick said in 2013, ‘Love is in the air. Breathe deep.’ Take Dick’s advice into your own hearts, and notice all of the beauty in the world, even when it seems cruel and unfair.”

Even Alice Cooper had a comment on the passing of the guitarist

Even though we know it’s inevitable, we never expect to suddenly lose close friends and collaborators.

“Dick Wagner and I shared as many laughs as we did hit records. He was one of a kind. He is irreplaceable. His brand of playing and writing is not seen anymore, and there are very few people that I enjoyed working with as much as I enjoyed working with Dick Wagner.

“A lot of my radio success in my solo career had to do with my relationship with Dick Wagner. Not just on stage, but in the studio and writing. Some of my biggest singles were ballads what I wrote with Dick Wagner. Most of ‘Welcome To My Nightmare’ was written with Dick. There was just a magic in the way we wrote together. He was always able to find exactly the right chord to match perfectly with what I was doing.

“I think that we always think our friends will be around as long as we are, so to hear of Dick‘s passing comes as a sudden shock and an enormous loss for me, rock ‘n’ roll and to his family.”

Death is never easy to deal with but perhaps we can all have the solace in the fact that Dick Wagner was a very popular man and that he is now finally at peace. R.I.P