Kevin Riddles / Angel Witch & NWOBHM Legend Dies After Cancer Fight

Kevin Riddles, NWOBHM legend and founding member of Angel Witch, Tytan and Baphomet, passed away on Friday, 4 July, after a battle with cancer. Kevin was also the owner of Boris, the dog who urinated on Ronnie James Dio’s new boots.

“It is with great sadness that we have to inform you all of the passing of the one and only Kevin Riddles, original Angelwitch member and bass player,” read a message on the Kev Riddles’ Baphomet. “We are all utterly devastated. Kevin ‘Kev’ Riddles passed away peacefully in hospital in the early hours of Friday morning.”

Tytan, Camden Underworld. 11 February 2023. Photo: Antonio Giannattasio/MetalTalk
Tytan, Camden Underworld. 11 February 2023. Photo: Antonio Giannattasio/MetalTalk

The Angel Witch song Baphomet was on the famous Metal For Muthas album. Following this, the recording of the Angel Witch album saw the band at its peak, embracing the opportunities and enjoying the experiences.

“I can look at it back on it now, and it comes across on the album,” Kevin told MetalTalk in a 2021 interview. “We kept the enthusiasm of playing live. We kept the fun aspect of it. We were never particularly serious. There was always that attitude of, by God, I’m enjoying this, you know.

“I was still working with the music shop at the time. I got married, moved into a company apartment, and did the Angel Witch thing. Uriah Heep were in the Roundhouse Studios, and here we are in the same Studio. I actually played the keyboard parts using Ken Hensley’s Hammond.”

Kevin Riddles, Angel Witch
Kevin Riddles Baphomet – Angel Witch.

A tour would follow with a Ronnie James Dio led Black Sabbath. For Kevin, watching the Heaven And Hell lineup play was something special. “Until that album came out, I had never really heard Ronnie Dio,” Kevin said. “I can’t tell you why. It’s just one of those things that passed me by. But hearing him from the side of the stage was just awesome. Jaw-dropping. I don’t think the band have ever played as well since. It was literally a match made in heaven.”

It was the last night of the tour that Boris made an impression.

“I brought my dog Boris along, and my plan was to walk on the stage while they were playing, dressed in a flat cap and a broom,” Kevin said. “I had a headset and mic, and I walked across the stage on a song break, going ‘come on, you get the fuck outta here, you have to go, you have finished here’ in a Northern accent.

“About a week prior to that, Ronnie had ordered these lambskin knee-length boots from some special tailor in London. He’s on the stage with these fantastic pair of boots, but Boris, the dog, has walked up to Ronnie and pissed on one of his boots.

“One of the few things I remember about physics at school was the term osmosis because as Boris was peeing on the boots, osmosis was drawing the pee up the boots, so they were gradually getting darker and darker and darker. Ronnie hadn’t noticed.

“When he moved at the start of the next song after I had left the stage, he suddenly started shaking his leg, realising what had happened. He just looked at me with a huge smile on his face, and he just said, ‘I’ll get you’.”

Ronnie’s revenge was to fill Kevin’s bed with shaving foam that night while he was sleeping.

Tytan, Camden Underworld. 11 February 2023.
Tytan, Camden Underworld. 11 February 2023. Photo: Antonio Giannattasio/MetalTalk

It was around the time of Covid that the Angel Witch album would be revisited. The idea for Kevin Riddles’ Baphomet came from wife, Julie. “She said, why didn’t you do something with that first album?” Kevin said. “There is the first album plus half a dozen extra songs that I was involved with. Angel Witch still have to play a lot of those songs now, but not all of them.”

The Baphomet gig at The Dev in December 2021 was a sellout. “Hopefully, we will get back a bit of that fun that we were having in the ’80s,” Kevin said. “That is the idea. If people revisit it in their heads, when they saw us at the Marquee, or when they saw us at Sundown, or when they saw us at Hammersmith, or when they saw us at Newcastle City Hall, if they walk out with a smile on their face, that is all I can ask.”

The post on the Baphomet page describes Kevin Riddles as an absolute legend in the truest sense of the word, a sentiment all in the Heavy Metal world agree with. “A larger than life character, an incredible and dedicated musician and a very fine and wonderful human being. Rest easy, big fella.”

Sleeve Notes

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