{"id":2924,"date":"2026-10-09T23:53:51","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T23:53:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/?p=2924"},"modified":"2026-10-09T23:53:51","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T23:53:51","slug":"rip-musical-youth-drummer-freddie-waite-jr-dies-at-55","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/?p=2924","title":{"rendered":"RIP: Musical Youth drummer Freddie Waite Jr. dies at 55"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Frederick \u201cFreddie\u201d Waite Jr<\/strong>, the original drummer for British-Jamaican reggae band <strong>Musical Youth<\/strong>, has passed away at age 55.<\/p>\n<p>Pictured clockwise, from bottom left: <strong>Michael Grant<\/strong>, Freddie Waite Jr., <strong>Patrick Waite<\/strong> (1968 \u2013 1993), <strong>Dennis Seaton<\/strong> and <strong>Kelvin Grant<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>A rep for the band confirmed his death in a statement on social media Thursday. \u201cWe are sad to announce the passing of Musical Youth\u2019s drummer Frederick Waite Jr. Our thoughts go out to him and his family during this sad time. We have lost a musical legend, who inspired many young musicians over the last 40 years. Rest in Eternal Peace.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Musical Youth is best known for their international hit song \u201cPass the Dutchie\u201d (1982). The song was No. 1 in 7 countries and went platinum in Canada. \u201cPass the Dutchie\u201d peaked at No. 10 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart.<\/p>\n<p>Waite Jr. was just 12 years old when he formed the Musical Youth with his brother, Patrick Waite (bassist) who died in 1985. They recruited the Grant brothers, Kelvin on guitar and Michael on keyboards. Vocalist Dennis Seaton joined the band later as frontman.<\/p>\n<p>Musical Youth found a new generation of fans when their classic single was featured on the US TV series <em>Stranger Things<\/em> season 4.<\/p>\n<p>The group disbanded in 1985 and returned in 2001 as a duo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Frederick \u201cFreddie\u201d Waite Jr, the original drummer for British-Jamaican reggae band Musical Youth, has passed away at age 55. Pictured clockwise, from bottom left: Michael Grant,&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2927,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2924"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2924\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2928,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2924\/revisions\/2928"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nulnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}