I'm sad to hear of his passing after battling cancer, I did get to see him with the Scorpions in the '80s.
Thanks for the music.
https://www.hellorayo.co.uk/planet-rock/news/rock-news/scorpions-michael-schenker-francis-buchholz-dead?fbclid=IwY2xjawPgZchleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeIffl4WU9Zl5qkqEV5IDgY2ysAzvZrmQwXzGDBCLoctg8Ccka_9N4-W6zo0s_aem_qI0DfKXAzSBTKAWSASAkXA
Sehr schade.
Francis had an interesting development as a bass player. Back in 1973 when Uli Roth's Dawn Road trio basically injected themselves into what was left of the first Scorpions line-up (basically Klaus + Rudolf) and Wishbone Ash was apparently still regularly on their turntables, he was all busy and melodic:
And then what I call his "German engineering mind" set in and he started to reduce his bass playing to the absolute minimum for greatest stadium impact. He'd go as far as to play quarter notes where Rudolf played eighths "to not clutter the sound" and leave room for those Hermann Rarebell drums.
Minimalism to the point of sounding angular sometimes. Small wonder he would set up a successful precision tooling and engineering company after his stadium rock star days.
The schism from the rest of the band in 1992 did not come from musical or personal differences. Francis was the "treasury minister" within the group and the Scorpions ran an elaborate tax scheme involving Luxemburg. But you can only believe to outsmart fiscal authorities for a certain extent of time. In 1992, the whole scheme capsized, the homes of Scorpions members where not so much dawn roaded as dawn raided and criminal charges for tax evasion were pressed. Francis sided with the Scorpions' tax advising and accounting firms who said that everything was hunky-dory (it wasn't) and the band never forgave him.
I saw him twice with ze Scörps and - many years later - once with Michael Schenker (with Hermann Rarebell playing the drums, they were a tight rhythm section).
PS: For all his craziness and idiosyncrasies plus megalomaniacal tendencies, Michael is one hell of an organic guitarist - and not just as a soloist, but also as a rhythm guitarist.
R.I.P. That's sad news. I'd say that he had still some great flavour in his playing when the Scorps went more commercial compared to a lot of other players in the genre they aimed for. That's what I really liked about his playing by that time. He could play simple in the pocket bass, yet put some great lines in that stood out.
The transition from more jammy songs à la Dawn Road to the stadium stompers favored by Klaus Meine and Rudolf Schenker drove out the Dawn Road members over time: First drummer Jürgen Rosenthal did not return to the Scorpions after his army time (Germany still had a draft) but preferred the more proggy Eloy to accomodate his busy drumming, then Uli Roth left after his swan song with Tokyo Tapes. Dawn Road bassist Francis was the only one to wholeheartedly make the transition to a more simply structured music (unlike Jürgen and Uli, Francis did not write).
Until the taxman knocked banged on the door (with search warrants!) that is in 1992 ...
Sad to see him go. He was a good, solid bass player. Simple and to the point. The band were completely formulaic by the time of their split, and grunge was on the horizon. He didn't miss anything. RIP
"Formulaic" is a good way of summing the Scorpions up in the 80s.