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Afterword

Michael Been, co-founder of the rock band The Call, dies at 60

By Claire Noland
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Michael Been, a singer, songwriter, guitarist and founding member of the Northern California modern rock band The Call, which broke out with the 1983 MTV hit “The Walls Came Down,” has died. He was 60.

Been died Thursday after suffering a heart attack at the Pukkelpop festival in Hasselt, Belgium, where he had been serving as a sound engineer for his son Robert’s band, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

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Been and the Call had famous fans in both the rock world –- Peter Gabriel once labeled the band the “future of American music” –- as well as in the realm of movies -- director Martin Scorsese cast Been as the Apostle John in his 1988 film adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis’ novel “The Last Temptation of Christ.”

Then Al Gore chose the band’s 1989 anthem “Let the Day Begin” as a theme song for his 2000 presidential campaign, closing the Democratic National Convention at Staples Center in downtown L.A. with the rousing anthem.

More later at www.latimes.com/obits.

-- Claire Noland

Afterword
Claire Noland

Claire Noland, who joined the Los Angeles Times in 1994, became editor of curated email newsletters in spring 2015. She had been in the Obituary Department since 2006, the last six years as editor. Before that, she was an editor in Sports. A California native and graduate of Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles, she worked at the Antelope Valley Press, Los Angeles Daily News and Minneapolis Star Tribune. She left The Times in December 2015.

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