Veteran musician Peter Forrest, best known as the lead singer and frontman of the pioneering Black rock band 24/7 Spyz, has died at the age of 64. His body was found badly beaten on an abandoned ambulette bus in the Bronx.
Forrest’s death is being investigated as a homicide by the New York Police Department. The musician was part of a wave of bands that emerged in the 1980s to prove that Black musicians could break beyond genres like hip-hop and R&B.
With his band, 24/7 Spyz, Forrest blended hardcore, metal, and funk, releasing two albums, “Harder Than You” (1989) and “Gumbo Millennium” (1990), which featured a mix of high-energy tracks and socially conscious lyrics. The band’s biggest hit was a remake of Kool and the Gang’s “Jungle Boogie.”
Forrest’s charismatic stage presence and unique vocal style, which included both singing and screaming, influenced many later musicians, including those in Faith No More and Fishbone. However, his time with 24/7 Spyz was marked by tension and personal struggles.
After leaving the band in 1990, Forrest pursued various side projects, including a short-lived band called P. Fluid Foundation and a reunion with 24/7 Spyz in 1995. He also collaborated with Living Colour’s Corey Glover and Angelo Moore on the project AFC. Most recently, he fronted the goth band BlkVampires.
Forrest’s friend and former bandmate Jimi Hazel remembered him as “a good motherfucker” who was both loved and hated by fans. Hazel credited Forrest with helping to shape the template for later rap-rock bands.
Source: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/p-fluid-247-spyz-singer-dead-obit-1235237150