Rockobit: Paul Raven

The death has been announced of former Killing Joke bassist Paul Raven.

Born in Wolverhampton in 1961, Raven played bass for Kitsch, a proto-Dogs D'Amour, but his first big break came when he joined Killing Joke, taking over as Youth quit. He stepped down from the band in 1988, rejoining for the band's 1990 Extremities, Dirt & Various Repressed Emotions album. Raven stayed on when the band dropped Jaz Coleman and morphed into Murder Inc. A 1992 Killing Joke reunion saw Youth return, but when the Joke revived in 2003 Raven again took on the bass.

A busy man, Raven also found time to be part of Prong and Godflesh, but perhaps achieved his greatest success after a meeting with Al Jourgensen led to him joining Ministry, a role he relished as it allowed him to bring his political side more to the fore:

"For me politics and punk rock went together. That has been handy about my association with Al and his Bush bashing. I have tried to keep my musical roots intact. I have lived in America so long I feel entitled to state my opinion. 'Maybe I can put a foot on George Bush's ass on his way out of the White House'."

Raven - who was working on a solo project, Mob Research - died of an apparent heart attack in a village on the France/Switzerland border.