Gustavo Cerati

Gustavo Adrián Cerati Clark grew up on the Beatles and the Police, drifted through adolescent bands, and in 1982 founded Soda Stereo in Buenos Aires. His songwriting sharpened fast: Signos in 1986, then Canción Animal in 1990 and Dynamo in 1992, all near-universally acclaimed and all with Cerati as leader, vocalist, composer, and guitarist. In 1992 he also released Colores Santos with Daniel Melero, an electronic experiment credited with opening that sound across South America. When Soda Stereo first split, he turned solo and restless: Amor Amarillo in 1993, the trip-hop-laced Bocanada in 1999, Siempre es hoy in 2002, then a return to straight rock with Ahí vamos in 2006, which gave him "Crimen" and "Adiós," two of his biggest solo tracks. A 2007 reunion tour with Soda Stereo sold over a million tickets. Three years later, in 2010, a stroke stopped him mid-sentence, and he never woke - four years comatose until cardiac arrest in September 2014.