RIP

Rock Star Dead at 78 After Brief Illness

The guitarist was behind one of the catchiest songs of the ’60s

Rock guitarist and singer-songwriter Mark Volman, founder of the band behind the 1967 hit song “Happy Together,” has died after a brief and sudden illness, Variety reports. He was 78. Volman grew up in a suburb of Los Angeles in the 1950s and early 1960s, falling in love with music at a young age. Soon after graduating high school in 1965, Volman got together with his friend Howard Kaylan and founded The Turtles, the band that would top charts two years later with their lush, reverb-heavy rock song, on which Volman sang harmony. “Happy Together” became one of the most-performed songs of the 20th century, often without Volman and Kaylan’s permission, leading to messy legal battles. The band broke up in 1970, leading Volman and Kaylan to form the duo Flo & Eddie, touring with Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention and making tracks for other rock bands, including T.Rex and Bruce Springsteen. Volman earned his bachelor’s degree in his forties, graduating as valedictorian, and completed an MFA in 1999. Before he was diagnosed with Lewy body dementia in 2020, Volman taught music business college courses in Nashville. He is survived by his wife and two daughters.