Very sad, I only recently listened to a lot of his good work with Roddie (a boxed set with all of Stewart's studio recordings) ...
HOWLER ALERT: Would you believe that I mistook him for a long time (until recently in fact) with Tetsu (and that Rod had simply dragged him along from the Faces for his solo career)?
I know, I know,
typical Western ignorance and stereotyping: "
Asian origins + playing bass with Rod Stewart = one and the same person", even if Japan (where Tetsu is from) and Jamaica (where Phil was born, he had Chinese heritage) lie some 8.000 miles apart ...
I'll crawl back under my rock now, shamefully so.
Which reminds me: Back in the 90ies I was for a week in Cuba, renegotiatoing debt the Cuban State owed to a German pharmaceutical. One of our negotiation counterparts was a man of Chinese heritage (I only learned then that about 10% of all Cubans have Chinese DNA in them). Of course he spoke Spanish and English, but what completely threw us off was the fact that he looked perfectly Asian, yet had all the habits, quirks and idiosyncracies of a typical "Latin American", it was a wonder to behold how a "Chinese face" looks when a "Cuban brain" steers its facial expressions. Same with the gestures. He spoke and gestured grandly and "machine-gunned" his Spanish - gone were all Asian sparse body language and verbal restraints, it was a real cross-culture tour de force experience.
The debt? After a week of grandstanding on both sides and lots of mojitos + Cohibas (to the point of nausea, don't drink mojitos and smoke cigars at the pool before noon if you have a negotiation round in the afternoon, ok?
), we came to a nice amicable settlement! One of my best business trips ever.
PS: BTW, at least Tetsu is alive and well (and still has his iconic Zemaitis) ...
