Vocalist and founding member of the heavy rock group Iron Butterfly, Doug Ingledied at 78 years old. He was the last surviving member of the classic line-up of the late 1960s.
“It is with a heavy heart and great sadness that I have to announce the passing of my father Doug Ingle.“, posted Doug Ingle Jr.
“Thank you dad for being a father, teacher and friend. Cherished memories of love that I will carry with me for the rest of my days moving forward on this journey of life. I love you dad,” he added, although he did not specify the cause of his death.
Ingle was the last surviving member of the original lineup of Iron Butterfly, a band that formed in San Diego in 1966, and also the only survivor of the so-called classic edition of the group that recorded “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” two Years later, the band had suffered a total turnover except for him.
The 17-minute song “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida” was responsible for most of Iron Butterfly’s success. It became a legendary song and also an affectionate joke in rock circles, as it was considered a symbol of excessive duration or simply something that a late-night FM disc jockey could play while smoking or going to the bathroom. It also paved the way for the development of hard rock and heavy metal music..
According to Variety, another iconic element of the track was its title, which was a mispronounced version of “In the Garden of Eden,” this because drummer Ron Bushy supposedly misheard it when Ingle first presented the song to the band.
The 1968 second album, named after the hit single, spent 81 weeks in the US top 10; for a time it was the best-selling album in Atlantic Records history. The LP obtained the certification of quadruple platinum.
Other versions of the hit were heard in the cinema, such as on the soundtrack of the film “Less Than Zero”, by Slayer; He also appeared in director Michael Mann’s thriller “Manhunter.”
It is worth mentioning that Iron Butterfly has not been as omnipresent a name in counterculture nostalgia as other groups of its time, partly because the group disbanded shortly after their biggest hitsin 1971, and did not enjoy the long meetings that others had.
But Ingle participated in a brief reunion in the late ’70s, two more in the ’80s, and finally a longer one in the late ’90s, which ended when Ingle retired completely in 1999.
Among the other members of the band from the classic “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” era, guitarist Erik Brann died in 2003, bassist Lee Dornan in 2012, and drummer Ron Bushy in 2021.
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