Goodbye to Gary Brooker- Serious loss to any Procol Harum fan!

I'm so saddened today to hear of the death of Gary Brooker, lead vocalist, piano player and co-writer of the music of Procol Harum. Harum is my #1 British group, in fact I used to annoy people telling them how much I felt the Beatles were overrated, but then carry on about how damn good Procol Harum was. It's obvious that A Whiter Shade of Pale was background music when I was growing up, that and the live version of Conquistador received quite a bit of radio play. But thanks to my best friend Paul Richichi, I became a full blown Harum fan when he turned me on to all the albums in the early 1980's. From there on, there was no stopping me from consuming anything Harum related. But why was I so infatuated? Because Harum was dark, gothic and moody. If you listen to Dead Mans Dream from the Home album, you might as well be watching a Lucio Fulci zombie movie. And this was recorded long before Fulci was messing with Zombies. Despite their Blues roots, the group was very British and didn't apologize for being that. They told stories of of being lost at sea (A Salty Dog) and subjected to the plights of lousy weather while afloat (The Wreck of the Hesperus). With Whaling Stories, they speak of a siege that "rots it all, and rots it clean". I'm a Long Island boy with strong British roots, why would I not love this! With Nothing That I Didn't Know, he speaks of the death of a young girl, most likely do to drugs (that's open for interpretation). But I've lost high school acquaintances to various means, so how could I not relate to all this. I was lucky enough to see Procol Harum at least 9 times over the past 30 years. While I was too young to see the classic line ups of the late 60's and early 70's, the reformed Harum which featured both Brooker and organist Matthew Fisher of the 90's and early 2000's was an amazing sight and sound. In fact the last show I had seen with Procol Harum was in 2019, I had taken a friend for his birthday. And I was never, ever disappointed with their shows, they were dead on every-time I had seen them. A few years earlier I was lucky enough to witness the group play the whole In Held Twas I. A complex number to say the least, they rarely did it live. I was blown out of my seat. I was counting on them touring again once all this Covid nonsense stopped. Looks like I wont be getting that show now. Gods speed to Gary Brooker, his voice defies description, and those Procol Harum albums will continue to bring me joy in the upcoming years. The photo below is myself with Gary Brooker at a Harum show back in 2014.