Anal Cunt Guitarist Dies In Escalator Accident
Josh Martin, longtime guitarist for legendary Massachusetts grindcore pranksters Anal Cunt, has died. Vanyaland confirmed that Martin died after falling off of an escalator at Providence Place mall on Monday night. Martin was 45.
Anal Cunt started in 1988, and Martin joined the band in 1996. He left in 2001, then rejoined the band in 2006 and kept playing with them until the 2011 death of frontman Seth Putnam. Martin also played in the bands Adolf Satan, Impaled Northern Moonforest, and Failure Clinic, as Pitchfork points out. And Martin also infamously heckled Gene Simmons at a show in Providence last year, goading Simmons into leaving the stage and roaming out into the crowd, looking for him.
The Providence TV station WPRI reports that Martin fell from the upper level down into the food court at 10:45 on Monday night, suffering severe head trauma. A witness told police that Martin was “clowning around and riding the rail of the escalator.” He slipped backward off that rail and hit his head on a food court table on the way down. The fall appears to be accidental, and Martin is the second person to die after falling from an escalator at that mall. He died later on Monday night at Rhode Island Hospital.
Below, watch the news report about Martin’s death and footage of him playing with Anal Cunt.