Friends, colleagues honor selfless soul
By Joan Anderman, Globe Staff, 7/14/2003
Tonight the city's music community will gather to celebrate the life of Mikey Dee, the beloved Boston music figure who died a week ago Sunday. Mikey and I weren't close friends; we had only known each other for a few years, mainly as colleagues, before he suffered a stroke in 2000 that left him unable to speak or move. But for a music writer new to Boston, meeting Mikey felt like serendipity.
Luck, of course, had nothing to do with it, because Mikey was everywhere, every night, it seemed, doing what he loved best: listening to music. There's a spot just to the right of the soundboard at the Middle East that might as well have been inscribed with Mikey's initials. While other industry types were swapping stories at the bar, Mikey was standing in his spot, usually alone, face upturned, listening. While locals made the scene, Mikey made mental notes for a review in the Noise or a segment on his radio show.
He was ubiquitous, but Mikey was hardly a mover and shaker. He didn't cut deals or sign bands or book shows. He couldn't be called a trendsetter. Mikey's tastes were uncomplicated by fashions. He loved music with a passion unconnected to a paycheck. It was a marvel to behold.
Mikey was one of the first people I met after moving to Boston from San Francisco in 1996. I don't remember the particulars of our introduction; I was a freelancer with few contacts and zero cred in the local scene. But I quickly figured out that if I walked up to Mikey at the Middle East and tapped him on the shoulder I would get a hug and a giant goofy grin and an exuberant summary of the band onstage -- and quite possibly the band playing next door, the singer-songwriter performing in 20 minutes across town, and the Midwestern power-pop band coming to town next week.
Mikey was beautifully uncool. To see him flush with the thrill of discovering a great young band was to witness the sort of unabashed fandom most of us had sacrificed to age or objectivity or some ridiculous definition of hip. While we nodded sagely, Mikey cheered. He was wide-eyed in a jaded world, an enthusiast among operators.
That's not to say he was a dreamer. Mikey was gainfully employed all over the music business -- as director of Triple A radio promotions for the Planetary Group, as associate editor at the music 'zine the Noise, as host of the WMFO radio show ''On the Town.''
Over the years we exchanged plenty of utilitarian e-mails. We even scratched each other's proverbial backs from time to time. But Mikey never lost touch with the simple joy he found in
music. Whether he clung tenaciously to his innocence or was blessed with a natural grasp of life's fundamentals is a mystery. It doesn't matter. His excitement was contagious and his selflessness was humbling. Mikey helped give the Boston music community its remarkable character not with a memorable song or a popular club or a well-known byline but rather an endless store of a far more valuable commodity: good will. Tragically, he became living proof that what goes around really does come around; the affection and devotion with which Mikey's friends cared for him during the last 3 1/2 years quite simply raised the bar on humanity.
When I went to visit Mikey at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital I forced my smiles and fought to hold back tears. Not Mikey. His face was stuck in a giant goofy grin and his tears flowed freely. Trapped in his body, Mikey still showed us -- profoundly, ironically -- how to live. Music made him happier than anything, and a constant stream of visitors brought him CDs.
On a couple of occasions friends made elaborate arrangements for Mikey to leave the hospital to attend a concert in his honor. Mikey's beloved Boston musicians gathered often in the hospital lounge to play his favorite songs, and Mikey listened for as long as he could.
A nondenominational memorial service will be held for Mikey Dee tonight at 7 at the Marsh Chapel at Boston University, 735 Commonwealth Ave. A reception will follow at the Paradise Rock Club.
This story ran on page B7 of the Boston Globe on 7/14/2003.
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