Founding Marilyn Manson Guitarist Scott ‘Daisy Berkowitz’ Putesky Dead at 49
Founding Marilyn Manson guitarist Scott "Daisy Berkowitz" Putesky has died at the age of 49.
The San Antonio Current reports that Putesky passed away after a four-year battle with stage four colon cancer. The band Jack Off Jill, who counted Putesky among their members from 1997 to 1998, paid tribute to him with a Facebook post calling him an artist and a hero.
Putesky and Brian Warner formed Marilyn Manson (originally named Marilyn Manson & the Spooky Kids) after meeting in 1989. In the same manner that Warner combined the names of Marilyn Monroe and Charles Manson to create his stage name, Putesky blended those of Dukes of Hazzard character Daisy Dukes and serial killer Dave Berkowitz.
Putesky appeared on the band's debut 1994 album Portrait of an American Family and their 1995 follow-up EP Smells Like Children. He departed amid deteriorating band relationships in the middle of the sessions for 1996's breakthrough Antichrist Superstar. "I was being shut out of recording sessions," he later told the New Times. "And when they were in there working on songs that I co-wrote, that doesn't make you feel very good."
After leaving Marilyn Manson, Putesky appeared on Jack Off Jill's 1998 EP Covetous Creature and released two albums and an EP under the moniker Three Ton Gate.