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The Star Baby has joined the Starman, we are sad to report.
The singer, whose band Dead or Alive has given lazy headline writers an easy shorthand to make light of his death without having to know a great deal about him, is understood to have died of cardiac arrest at the age of 57.
Burns was best known in recent years for appearing on Celebrity Big Brother, where he demonstrated his remarkable talent for making anything fabulous by even managing to make George Galloway look comparatively normal.
However, people who knew his work remember Burns for a very different reasons; a moment of quite inexpressible joy dancing to his music in a rain of balloons one New Years Eve, surrounded by people who had in their turn been given permission to be strange and different at a time when these things were less accepted.
By simply not giving the faintest crap what other people thought of him or his actions Burns gave others the confidence and power to express themselves in ways they otherwise would not have dreamed, and it is that simple contribution that is his finest legacy and it is to be hoped there’s a special place where complete weirdos congregate in the afterlife, as he’ll fit right in.
The last thing Pete would want is for people to be too sad at the news of his death. That would make him spin in his grave.
Spin right round.
Like a record, baby.
Right round.
