Fats Domino & Alex Chilton Missing

The sadness doesn't stop.

From E! (and tipped by spinachdip nyc):

One of rock 'n' roll's chief architects is missing in the rubble of New Orleans. Fats Domino and his family were unaccounted for Thursday, presumed lost in his home town in the wake of the catastrophic Hurricane Katrina.

Domino was last heard from on Sunday night, a day before the storm struck. During a phone call with longtime agent Al Embry, the 77-year-old R&B legend insisted he would ride out the hurricane in his three-story New Orleans home with his wife, Rosemary, and daughter."I hope somebody turns him up, but as of right now, we haven't got anybody that knows where he's at," Embry told the wire service. "I would think he might be safe because somebody said he was on top of the balcony."

Domino's house was located in the city's 9th Ward, an area that is heavily flooded and littered with dead bodies.

But at least one report bearing hopeful news has come in.

Satirist and Simpsons star Harry Shearer, who holds strong ties to the wracked city, told Reuters that he had heard unconfirmed reports from friends that Domino made it to the New Orleans Superdome, where more than 20,000 displaced citizens took refuge.

And from an email forwarded to me from the fellow that writes Confessions of a Butcher:

Henry Owings (Chunklet Magazine) just posted this bulletin on MySpace.


So apparently a lot of NO's music folk are going to memphis. My buddy
Andy has just informed me that Quintron's okay. He was visiting his
mother when it all went down. No news about Miss Pussycat as of yet.

However, Alex Chilton would not leave his house when Peg & Dan Rose
came to get him. A fist fight ensued, and Alex gave them the keys to
his truck. Totally crazy. But Alex is nowhere to be seen and he was in
a location that's not looking too good.

That's all I know. People have been asking me about Quintron (he was
scheduled to play Atlanta this weekend) so I'm just the messenger.

UPDATE:

Good news! According to CNN, Fats has been found.

Rock 'n' roll pioneer Fats Domino was among the thousands of New Orleans residents plucked from rising floodwaters, his daughter said Thursday. Karen Domino White, who lives in New Jersey, identified her father in a picture taken Monday night by a New Orleans Times-Picayune photographer.

The photograph shows Domino -- the singer behind the 1950s hits "Ain't That a Shame" and "Blueberry Hill" -- being helped off a boat near his home in the city's Lower 9th Ward.

His whereabouts since the rescue were not immediately known. Nor was there any information about his wife, Rosemary, friends said.