Myrna "Peach" Brown, who led the Atlanta funk-soul band Whild Peach with guitarist David Whild, passed away from breast cancer April 1.

Whild Peach's name may be unfamiliar, but most everyone has heard its music. As a much underrated member of the Dungeon Family, Whild Peach contributed to most of OutKast's albums (with "I Like the Way You Move" and "Liberation" being two major highlights), Killer Mike's Monster and Goodie Mob's Still Standing. The group played on tracks for Pink, Raphael Saddiq, Macy Gray and TLC. Whild Peach also released several CDs of original material, including last year's Greatest Hits Volume One.

"She had been battling breast cancer for the past 11 years, but very few knew about it. ... She wanted to be treated like she was living, not dying," wrote friend and fellow funk goddess Joi in a post on her MySpace page. She went on to call Peach "the baddest fucking singer and performer that this planet has ever seen."

"She had a powerful voice. You couldn't help but pay attention when you heard her," says Carmen Lovelace, Whild Peach's manager. "She was the epitome of funk and rock 'n' roll."

Whild Peach plans to stay together and tour the West Coast this summer. It held an impromptu wake at Sugarhill on April 3, but Lovelace says the group plans to do a proper memorial and tribute for Peach in the near future. "It's hard on all of us. She was a star, and she was everything," she says. "But we've got to move on."

source: http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/