Alan Merrill, who co-wrote the smash-hit Joan Jett anthem “I Love Rock and Roll,” has died from coronavirus complications, his daughter said.
The Bronx-born rocker, 69, died Sunday morning, daughter Laura Merrill posted to Facebook.
“I was given 2 minutes to say my goodbyes before I was rushed out,” she wrote in a heartbreaking post. “He seemed peaceful and as I left there was still a glimmer of hope that he wouldn’t be a ticker on the right hand side of the CNN/Fox news screen. I walked 50 blocks home still with hope in my heart….By the time I got in the doors to my apartment I received the news that he was gone.”
“How could this be?” she added. “I was just at his show a couple of weeks ago,” she wrote. “I had just photographed his portrait for his new album. Texted with him earlier. He played down the ‘cold’ he thought he had. I’ve made a million jokes about the ‘Rona’ and how it’ll ‘getcha’… boy do I feel stupid.”
Merrill wrote “I Love Rock and Roll” for his band The Arrows and recorded it in 1975. The song took the airwaves by storm when Jett covered it in 1982.
Jett, 61, mourned Merrill’s death in a Twitter tribute.
“I’ve just learned of the awful news that Alan Merrill has passed,” she wrote. “My thoughts and love go to his family, friends and music community as a whole. I can still remember watching the Arrows on TV in London and being blown away by the song that screamed hit to me. With deep gratitude and sadness, wishing him a safe journey to the other side.”
Merrill also spent time in Switzerland, Los Angeles and Japan before launching his music career in the Big Apple.
With Post wires