RIP Slim Dunlap, Replacements guitarist

[exitflagger]

It is being reported that he died today. Does anybody have confirmation of this?

I know his health has been terrible after suffering a stroke.

[Dyslexicheart]

It's widely reported and confirmed on 'Mats sites, looks like sadly it's true. I got to see Slim with The Replacements way back in 1987 in London on their Pleased to Meet Me tour. One of the best shows and greatest nights of my life. Slim was by all accounts a great guy, a real working musician until his devastating stroke several years ago. RIP

[exitflagger]

Must've just happened. Now more outlets are reporting it, although not his wiki page.

Very sad news. Being a guitarist for that band has a pretty rough history to it.

[Psychobolia.com]

Was he a replacement or an OG Replacement?

[Bono Nettencourt]

Was he a replacement or an OG Replacement?

Scab.

[Dyslexicheart]

From Facebook post of Bob Mehr, author of The Replacements biography "Trouble Boys"

Robert Bruce “Slim” Dunlap: 1951-2024
There’s a lot I could say about Slim and about his career. The fact that he came in and was human superglue for the Replacements at a moment where they could’ve easily come apart. That he helped keep the group going for more years and tours and albums than seemed possible. Slim’s unique personality – his kindness and counsel, his bulldog tenacity and the thoughtful way he protected them – made that happen.
I could talk about Slim’s own music and solo albums, but Bruce Springsteen, who's famously raved about them, can offer better testimony, as can the many esteemed artists—Jeff Tweedy, Lucinda Willams, Steve Earle – who’ve covered his songs.
I could tell you how Slim, along with his first and forever partner Curtiss A, were in many ways responsible for birthing, or at least helping midwife, the entire original/punk/new wave/alt rock scene in Minneapolis.
But mostly, what I want to share about Slim is his humanity – his strange, wonderful, and unique essence.
I found out a lot about Slim the first time we spoke. I was coming out to Minneapolis to interview him for my Replacements book. We’d never met, he didn’t know me, and had every reason to be suspicious and guarded, but he wasn’t. Instead he offered to pick me up from the airport: “Ya need any transpo, Bob?” he asked, with the neighborly impulse of someone raised in tiny Plainview, Minnesota (pop. 1500).
Slim was a character, like someone out of a Frank Capra movie – he came from time and a place and an America that I never really believed existed. And maybe it never did. But Slim was real and beautiful and made you believe. (I think Tom Waits loved Slim for the same reason).
Getting to know Slim, I quickly realized he was more than just a “nice guy,” though. He was smarter and more streetwise than his reputation (or he himself) would lead you to believe. But mostly, what I came to appreciate about him was his magnificent generosity as a human being. Not just towards me, but to anyone and everyone he ever encountered. You can see that in the outpouring, the stories, the sweet recollections of him over the last 24 hours.
The interviews I did with Slim provided a spiritual roadmap for Trouble Boys. Slim understood the dynamics of music, musicians, rock ‘n’ roll, and the brotherhood of bands better than anyone. The only other person I’ve encountered with that kind of wisdom was Replacements producer Jim Dickinson. There’s a great photo of the two of them, dressed wildly and talking animatedly during the playback party for “Pleased to Meet Me.” A pair of Slims: East Memphis Slim and Slim Dunlap. Man, to have been a fly on the wall hearing those two exchanging stories (some of them might’ve even been true!)
As I look at the calendar, I can’t help but notice some cosmic poetry in the fact that Bob Stinson was born on Dec. 17 and Bob Dunlap died on Dec. 18. They were inextricably linked from the first time Slim gave a young Bob a ride in his cab -- this was long before there ever was a Replacements. And then years later Slim had the unenviable task of replacing Bob in the band. But it was Bob who pushed Slim to join the group, to take his spot. The two of them were working as janitors in the fall of 1986 at First Avenue, and Bob Stinson would pester Slim about the gig, telling him he needed to play with the Replacements, miming guitar licks on his broom, showing him his old parts.
That should tell you EVERYTHING about Slim Dunlap. He was the only man Bob Stinson believed worthy of taking *his* place in *his* band. (btw, is there another Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominated group that can say that every guy who played guitar in the band had also been a janitor?!)
Herman Melville once said something that applies perfectly to Slim: “Our lives are connected by a thousand invisible threads, and along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes and return to us as results.” Because of the stroke he suffered in 2012, we saw the results of a lifetime of Slim’s selfless actions. The way people rallied around him, the way that he brought the Replacements back to life (again), the way his family devoted themselves to him. It was simply beautiful. An inspiration.
No one has been more inspiring in all this than Slim’s wife Chrissie. Her loyalty, sacrifice, and devotion…there aren’t words to express the depth of my admiration for her and the awe and esteem I hold her in. Slim and Chrissie, that is love in its purest and highest form.
A couple years back, Slim and Chrissie were moving from their place in South Minneapolis and had an estate sale. I asked a friend of mine to pick up something for me, a door knocker with the name Dunlap engraved on it. I thought of it as something for my wife Coco and I to put in our own house as a little reminder. I figured any home that could contain as much love and light as the Dunlaps is something to aspire to.
Anyway, thinking of Chrissie and the Dunlap family, and Slim’s friends in MPLS and all over the world. We were lucky to have known such a man.

[Ozzy Stradlin]

I was sorry to see this.

I saw Slim play solo several times in the Minneapolis area in the 90s, & he was the real deal.