From Newsgroup: alt.obituaries

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckg1rrzn1kwo

In 1981, an unlikely group from Leeds scored a number one hit
with their icy cover version of an obscure 60s soul hit.

With Tainted Love, Soft Cell set a template for 80s synth-pop
duos: The flamboyant frontman paired with an unassuming keyboard
technician.

Dave Ball, who has died at the age of 66, was that musical
force, creating ominous, polyphonic soundscapes to match Marc
Almond's lyrics about X-rated movies and sado-masochism.

Tainted Love sold more than 21 million copies across the world
and was followed by hits such as Say Hello, Wave Goodbye and
Torch, before the band split in 1984. Reunited in the 2000s,
they had completed a new album in the days before Ball's death.

In a statement, the musician's family said he had died peacefully
in his sleep at his home in London on Wednesday 22 October.

It comes less than two months after Soft Cell played a headline
show to 20,000 fans at the Rewind Festival in Henley-on-Thames.

During that concert, Ball performed in a wheelchair, as he had
for the last two years, following a spate of ill-health.

"I managed to damage myself quite a bit," he told the Yorkshire
Post in 2023. "I fractured lower vertebrae in my spine and
cracked about five ribs and broke my wrist".

After catching pneumonia and developing sepsis, he was placed
in an induced coma and remained in hospital for seven months.

However, he had been in "a great place emotionally" over the
summer, as he worked on Soft Cell's new album, Danceteria,
which is scheduled for release next year.

[...]
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Mark Shaw moc TOD liamg TA wahsnm ========================================================================
"Anyway, we delivered the bomb."
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