Chas & Dave star dies in his sleep aged 74
WHEN singer Chas Hodges, of Chas & Dave fame, was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer last year, he went into the studio with his musical partner Dave Peacock and wrote a track called Sling Your Hook.
‘It was my way of saying f*** off to cancer,’ Hodges told the MoS earlier this year. ‘Sling your hook, on your bike, vamoose, skedaddle.’ But in the early hours of yesterday he died in his sleep, aged 74, from organ failure.
His blunt response to his diagnosis had been in keeping with Chas & Dave’s reputation as down-to-earth stars whose blend of rock’n’roll, pub singalong and Cockney rhyming slang made them household names.
That appeal was clear as tributes poured in last night. Singer Billy Bragg wrote: ‘He was an original skiffler, a boogie-woogie great, and singing Midnight Special with him and Dave at Union Chapel [in London] was on my career highlights.’
Boxer Frank Bruno said: ‘I worked with Chas & Dave loads of times in the 1980s and had a good laugh with them every time.’
Chas leaves behind his wife of 52 years, Joan. She was one of the original Playboy bunny girls and they had three children, Juliet, Kate, a singer/songwriter, and Nik, a musician and composer, and two grandchildren.
Chas last performed with Dave Peacock, 73, at the British Summer Time festival in London’s Hyde Park in July, and a greatest hits album is due out next week.