documentary in progress: wheredowegofromheredoc.com

wiki: Death was a band formed in Detroit, Michigan, in 1971 by the brothers Bobby (bass, vocals), David (guitar), and Dannis (drums) Hackney. The African-American trio started out as an R&B band but switched to rock after seeing an Alice Cooper show.[1] Music critic Peter Margasak retrospectively wrote of their musical direction, "The youngest of the brothers, guitarist David, pushed the group in a hard-rock direction that presaged punk, and while this certainly didn’t help them find a following in the mid-70s, today it makes them look like visionaries."[2]

The young Hackney brothers were sat down by their father to witness The Beatles' first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. The following day, eldest sibling David found a discarded guitar in an alley.

In 1975 at Detroit’s United Sound Studios with engineer Jim Vitti, they recorded seven songs written by David and Bobby. According to the Hackney family, Columbia Records president Clive Davis funded the recording sessions, but asked the band to change its name to something more commercially palatable than Death. When the Hackneys refused, Davis ceased his support[3]. At any rate, they only recorded seven songs instead of the planned dozen. The following year they self-released 500 copies from the session on the 7" single “Politicians in My Eyes” b/w “Keep on Knocking,” on their Tryangle label, which eventually became a collectors' item.

The brothers then moved to Burlington, Vermont, and released two albums of gospel rock as The 4th Movement in the early 1980s. David moved back to Detroit in 1982, and died of lung cancer in 2000. Bobby and Dannis still reside in Vermont and lead the reggae band Lambsbread. After hearing Death's music played at underground parties in California and witnessing the crowd's "wild" response to it[4], Bobby's 3 sons, Bobby Hackney Jr. (vocals), Julian Hackney (guitar), Urian Hackney (drums) and two friends Dylan Giambatista (guitar) and Steve Williams(bass) formed a punk band called Rough Francis in their family's honor. Rough Francis is a musical tribute to Death, and they also write original material that is heavily influenced by their elders.

In 2009, Drag City records released all seven Death recordings on CD and LP under the title ...For the Whole World to See.