Ike Turner

This afternoon when I went to pick up The Calvinator I heard on NPR that Ike Turner died today. He was 76 years old.

Together with his ex-wife Tina, they recorded some classic songs: River Deep, Mountain High (long before Erasure and Celine Dion); A Fool In Love; It's Gonna Work Out Fine; and their signature song of the Creedence Clearwater hit Proud Mary.

For all of their successes, it was not a happy marriage. In fact, in interviews I have heard Tina refer to her marriage to Ike as "that relationship I was in." In her book I, Tina Tina wrote about the physical abuse she suffered. Ike has always denied it.

When the book was released in 1987, Ike made an appearance on The Maury Povich Show. Ike was there to tell his side of the story. Within the first 10 minutes of the interview, Maury addressed the allegations of physical abuse. Maury said, "Did you ever hit your ex-wife?" Ike replied, "If I did, she deserved it."

The audience turned on Ike and I honestly cannot remember the rest of the show after that comment.

And that is all that I have to say about Ike Turner.