Michael Sumler, who worked for years as both an onscreen publicity man and a behind-the-scenes artist for the ancient soul-funk party Kool &, the Gang, passed away on Sunday in a car accident in Georgia. He was 71.
A group official confirmed his death. According to a report from Atlanta-based Television place 11Alive, Sumler was killed when his car and another vehicle collided on Veterans Memorial Highway in Cobb County, Georgia. Summers, who was known as” Chicken Mike,” had performed with the group Con Funk Shun on Sunday night in Mableton, Georgia. Michael Cooper also paid tribute to Sumler on social media.
We didn’t know Sunday evening’s Love’s Train would be your final ride, Cooper  wrote. ” Sleep in earthly part.”
Sumler was described as “our long clothing attendant” by Kool &, the Gang in a statement from 2000 to 2015, “making convinced the men looked their best on level every day.” Summertime “also hyped the crowd with his strength and party swings at the top of the show,” the group continued.
Kool &, the Gang was founded in Jersey City, New Jersey in the middle of the 1960s by brothers Robert Bell ( who went by the name Kool ) and Ronald Khalis Bell along with several neighborhood friends in the 1960s and is renowned for hits like” Ladies Night”,” Jungle Boogie,”” Get Down on It,” and” Celebration.” Khalis Bell passed away in 2020, and George” Funky” Brown, the singer’s foundational musician, passed away in 2023. The Rock &, Roll Hall of Fame named Kool &, the Gang as” the most examined group in hip-hop story” last month.
One of the many songs that have taken parts from Kool &, the Gang’s music is Nas ‘” N. Y.” The Wu-Tang Clan’s” Method Man,” Mase’s” Feel So Good,” and DJ Jazzy Jeff &, the Raw Prince’s” Summertime” are just a few examples of the genre’s” State of Mind.”
After a long and extraordinary closing as a result of the COVID-19 epidemic, Kool &, the Gang became the first work to play for a full-capacity crowd at the Hollywood Bowl in 2021.
Sumler’s individuals ‘ information wasn’t immediately made available.
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