We're very sad to hear of Stephen Gately's death at the age of 33.
As a 1990s boyband member it wasn't Stephen's job to redefine pop music or to inspire millions of musicians to make deep and meaningful music in subsequent decades, so the usual pop obituary platitudes we're all used to reading (and writing) have to go out of the window. Instead, it's useful to tihnk that for the generation whose teenage years he helped soundtrack, his death will likely inspire the reawakening of a far more direct emotional connection. Even a decade later, the memory of a poster hastily Blu-Tacked to a bedroom wall or a photo Sellotaped to the inside front page of a Tricolore textbook will always be more personally significant than someone on the news banging on about how they were inspired to rip off a bassline. Whether they've moved on or whether they stumped up for tickets to the Boyzone reunion tour, Stephen's fans will find that today's news might result in a very strong, and maybe even quite unexpected, emotional reaction.