But his music will live on forever. From CNN:

The Mamas and the Papas' John Phillips dies Singer, songwriter John Phillips helped define the 1960s March 18, 2001 Web posted at: 7:17 p.m. EST (0017 GMT)

LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- John Phillips, a singer and songwriter whose music helped define the 1960s, died of heart failure Sunday morning. He was 65.

The member of the Mamas and the Papas died at the University of California Medical Center, said a hospital spokesman.

Phillips daughter, Mackenzie Phillips, was with her father when he died.

"Our father passed away this morning," she said in a statement. "He went peacefully. I was there along with my father's wife, Farnaz, Bill Cleary, my father's best friend since he was six years old, and my father's cousin and his wife."

"We're all mourning the loss of our Dad. He was a genius and a good man and he will be missed. I spent the morning with my sisters Bijou and Chynna. We're all on the way to the beach to talk and walk and swim and to celebrate my father's life, " the statement said.

Elizabeth Freund, a New York-based spokeswoman for Phillips, said the singer entered the hospital a couple of weeks ago with a shoulder injury. While there, doctors discovered a stomach infection, which hurt his kidneys, Freund said.

Hits by the Mamas and the Papas included: "California Dreamin'" and "Monday, Monday."

-- Aunt Bee (Aunt__Bee@hotmail.com), March 18, 2001

Answers

Like many of the "greats" who have passed on, they will be missed, but their music will live on to bring joy and happiness to many.

-- rockon (rockon@rockonnn.bom), March 18, 2001.

John Edmund Andrew Phillips was born on August 30th 1935, in Paris Island, S.C., the son of a military man and a housewife. From an early age, he showed great musical talent, learning to play piano and guitar. In high school he formed several rock and roll bands with friends, and knew early on that music was the only career for him.

On the completion of his education in the late 1950’s, John headed for New York and met two other singers, Dick Weissman and Scott McKenzie. The three formed a folk group called The Journeymen. The Journeymen toiled in the coffeehouses of Greenwich Village for several years, playing their own original music and the hits of others, but folk groups were a dime a dozen at that time, and John started to feel that they would never be noticed. During this time John also met his first wife, Susan. They had two children together, Laura, who would later be known as MacKenzie, and Jeffrey.

The Journeymen often played at a coffeehouse called the hungry i. That is where, one day in the early sixties, John met a model named Michelle Gilliam. He discovered that she could sing, and fell in love almost instantly. John was 26, and Michelle was just 17. He left his wife and children, and he and Michelle were married on December 31, 1962. A year later, they met folksinger Denny Doherty and began talking about a musical collaboration. The only sticking point was Denny’s good friend Cass Elliot. Denny insisted that Cass be included in any of their projects, but John, ironically, did not like her voice and didn’t feel she’d “blend in.” John changed his mind after Cass impressed him with a high note, and The Mamas and the Papas were born.

The group moved to Los Angeles, feeling that their sound might be better appreciated in California. They were right. Soon The Mamas and the Papas were discovered by producer Lou Adler, and on October 1, 1965, the group was signed to Dunhill Records.

Over the next few years, John Phillips became a hit machine. He wrote or cowrote many of The Mamas and the Papas' songs, and arranged wonderful versions of other artists’ songs for the group to cover. He and Adler were especially effective at choosing material for and bringing the best out in Cass, who became known for her beautiful but saucy ballads.

On February 1, 1966, The Mamas and the Papas hit Number 1 on the charts with “California Dreamin’.” It was followed by other hits such as “Monday, Monday” and “Go Where You Wanna Go.” Their album “If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears” stayed on the charts for longer than any Beatles album, aside from “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” John’s old friend Scott McKenzie had a huge hit with John’s song “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair),” a rather laughable (to many critics) paean to the California lifestyle. Indeed, John and his band mates weren’t just musicians, but symbols of the hippie movement. Their long hair and outrageous fashions were copied by young people across the nation.

There was, unfortunately, the proverbial dark side to the money and fame. John was almost constantly unfaithful to Michelle, who he now shared a daughter, Chynna with, yet he became enraged when he found out that she had slept with Doherty. This news also upset Cass, who had been in love with Denny for years. John also began experimenting with drugs, and soon he was in the throes of addiction. John and Michelle divorced in 1970, but were forced to continue working together because they had a contract with Dunhill that had to be honored. In 1971, a sub-par effort, “People Like Us,” was released to little interest, and the group broke up. Michelle became an actress, starring on “Falcon Crest” in the 1980’s. Denny dropped out of sight for over a decade. And Cass, after a successful solo career, died of a heart attack in 1974, at the age of 33.

After the Mamas and the Papas broke up, John’s life went into a tailspin. He was hooked on heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, and alcohol. He admits in his autobiography, “Papa John” that he often got high with his teenage daughter, MacKenzie, who was now a star on the television series “One Day at a Time.” Finally, a drug bust in the early eighties pushed him and his wife, Genevieve Waite, into drug therapy. In recent years he has claimed sobriety and toured with a new version of the Mamas and the Papas—himself, Denny Doherty, MacKenzie, and Spanky McFarlane.

-- So (cr@t.es), March 18, 2001.

California Dreaming

-- (oldie@but.goodie), March 19, 2001.

His music may have been great, but a recent documentary of Mckenzie revealed him to be a sick one, to say the least.

He encouraged his daughter to use drugs for crying out loud.

-- mm (monday@monday.right), March 19, 2001.

It was a culture deal mm. Today all the leaves are brown and let's just leave it at that.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), March 20, 2001.