It's not a good week for tawny-heads... it was sad to hear of the death today of Malcolm McLaren.

Love him or hate him, you couldn't ignore him.

It appears he has been ill with cancer for some time but it had been kept quiet.

His ex-partner Vivienne Westwood has said "When we were young and I fell in love with Malcolm, I thought he was beautiful and I still do. I thought he is a very charismatic, special and talented person. The thought of him dead is really something very sad"

From New York Dolls to The Sex Pistols, from Bow Wow Wow to Boy George, from bringing the underground sounds of hip-hop and Vogue house to a wider public to mixing electro beats to classic opera... he had an unerring knack for seeing a new area for discovery then moving on as soon as it was spotlighted.

His confrontational behaviour won him enemies - and it's a shame that his Situationist activities ostracised the very people he had put in the front line, but the world will be a poorer place for his absence.

He had said in January "‘I have concluded that this is the year that pop culture has finally become a crumbling ruin. No matter where I look and listen, the ruins are all I am beginning to care about. I believe in the ruins."

It has crumbled a bit more with today's news.