Australian musician Alex ‘Zack’ Zytnik has died, aged 79.
Alex was a founding member and lead guitarist for seminal 1960s psychedelic rock band Tamam Shud.
News of the rocker’s passing broke on social media and friends and fans were quick to offer their tributes.
One fan, Nicci Davidson, shared news of Alex’s passing to multiple Facebook groups in November.
‘Vale to Aussie rock royalty, Alex Zitnik (Zac) who passed away today,’ she wrote.
The post continued, chronicling Alex’s musical career, which began in Newcastle in 1964 in the band The Four Strangers.
Beloved Australian musician Alex ‘Zack’ Zytnik, founding guitarist for seminal Aussie psych-rockers Tamam Shud has died, aged 79
Nicci also paid tribute to Alex’s musical ability and the influence his work with Tamam Shud has.
‘Zac has left an indelible mark on the Australian classic rock scene of the 60s and 70s which brought to life the surf rock culture of Newcastle,’ the post continued.
‘RIP Zac you will be sadly missed but your music will live on – hopefully they’ll give you a gig in rock and roll heaven.
The post was met with a flurry of tributes from friends and fans who took to social media to remember the guitarist.
‘I first saw Zac in late 1963 at a church dance in Wickham, Newcastle in a band that shortly after called themselves The Strangers (later changed to The Four Strangers),’ one fan remembered.
‘The guitar he had, at the time, I purchased when he bought his Fender Stratocaster. His music legacy will always be the many recordings he made with the bands with whom he worked.
‘His musical ability was always a cut above his contemporaries. RIP Zac.’
Another replied with a simple: ‘RIP old mate’.
News of the sonic architect’s (pictured second left) passing broke on social media and friends and fans were quick to offer their tributes.
Alex released just one album with Tamam Shud, Evolution in 1969, before being replaced by Tim Gaze for the band’s second album, 1970’s Goolutionites and the Real People
Despite Alex’s limited output for Tamum Shud his influence loomed large, particularly in the burgeoning Aussie surf culture of the late 1960s
Alex formed the Four Strangers with Eric Connell, Dannie Davidson and Gary Johns in 1964.
Following some name and lineup changes, the band took the name Tamam Shud in 1967.
Alex released just one album with Tamam Shud, Evolution in 1969, before being replaced by Tim Gaze for the band’s second album, 1970’s Goolutionites and the Real People.
Despite Alex’s limited output for Tamum Shud his influence loomed large, particularly in the burgeoning Aussie surf culture of the late 1960s.
Four tracks from the album Evolution were used in a surf film of the same and following Alex’s departure, Tamam Shud provided songs for the soundtrack of the iconic 1972 surf film Morning Of the Earth.
The band also have the honour of playing at the very first outdoor rock festival – The Pilgrimage of Pop, held in Ourimbah on the NSW Central Coast in 1970.
Rock historian Ian McFarlane said the band were one of the first in Australia to be influenced by the psuchedelic sounds coming out of San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury scene of the 1960s.
‘Tamam Shud was one of the first local bands to embrace the late 1960s psychedelic sounds of Cream, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Pink Floyd, Eric Burdon and The (New) Animals, plus the San Francisco stylings of The Grateful Dead and their ilk,’ he wrote.
‘As an outgrowth of the acid-rock movement, Tamam Shud was able to translate the music into a uniquely Australian context.
‘Tamam Shud became inextricably linked with the surfing fraternity, with audiences seemingly transfixed by the band’s enveloping acid-surf progressive rock.’