david ruffin death scene
Their grief was compounded by stories that they felt tore his character down, she said. The card on a bouquet from British singer Rod Stewart and his wife read, You were a great influence on me. June 1, 1991 - The great David Ruffin dies June 1 marks the anniversary of the death of the great David Ruffin. Before joining Motown, Terrell worked for James Brown. Could trucks be to blame for killing more pedestrians? Her father, Quincy Ruffin, a member of the U.S. Army Special Forces, had long insisted that he had been an orphan. Unexplained circumstances surrounding his death caused his family to suspect some kind of foul play, though nothing was ever remotely proven. Those elements came together in the Snake Pit, a studio in the basement of Motown's Detroit headquarters. But then everywhere we went, we heard My Girl. Ruffin and his ex-wife, Sandra, of Detroit, had three children. I remember we were performing at the (long defunct Detroit nightclub) The 20 Grand and Smokey said: I have a song for you guys, recalls Williams of the birth of their signature My Girl. However, the record label nonetheless made her famous before she became infamous. It was shortly before 3 a.m. on June 1 when Brown pulled up to the emergency room entrance to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, and told hospital staff that his passenger, David Ruffin, had overdosed. Six-foot-two and lamppost skinny, his face framed by thick, dark eyeglasses, Ruffins vocal cords powered the Temptations most popular song, My Girl it went to No. Two years later, Paul parked two blocks away from Motown and took his own life. During the defense's cross-examination of E. Jean Carroll, Trump's attorney asked the writer why she "did not scream" when she was "supposedly raped. It wasnt called a disease. Sit back and relax!. Reeves wishes the tributes had come earlier. Terrell was only 24 when she died. Keep reading with unlimited digital access. As the singer later recalled, "By the time I was 12 there wasn't an inch of my body that hadn't been bruised and beaten." And though no one knew it at the time, in 1969 a future Motown star was born literally. She gets on the phone and told me she was ill and asked: God, dont take me until I speak to Otis Williams. She said she wanted to tell me how much the music meant to her before she died. Ruffin had just come off of a successful tour overseas with a briefcase holding at least $50,000. They were enabling him.. Age, Biography and Wiki. Although the cause of death was ruled an accident, Ruffin's family and friends suspected foul play, claiming that a money belt containing the proceeds from the tour ($300,000) was missing from his body. Due to his hectic touring schedule, Williams character bemoans missing out on Lamonts youth and the story reaches an emotional apex when its revealed he tragically died in a construction accident at 24 years old. Non-personalized content and ads are influenced by things like the content youre currently viewing and your location (ad serving is based on general location). Showers, who had been living with Ruffin for several years in west Philadelphia, said she never saw the $40,000, but knew he was supposed to have it, and that he was supposed to have wired it to his partners during the week of May 26. As fate would have it, he wound up in Detroit just as the citys homegrown Motown Records (founded by Berry Gordy and named, of course, after the citys then claim to fame as the automobile capital of the world) was in its infancy. From a seat in the audience, he began to serenade her. "My Girl," their early 1965 breakthrough, was followed by a string of hits over the next four years. In the. Its a sentiment that has lasted through the Temptations success, as they have held onto the distinction of being one of the most commercially dominant vocal groups in music history. Michael Jackson didn't sing those words about a person but about music. She said she last saw him on Wednesday. In my home, theres a big painting of a friend of mine made of all of the Temptations. Ruffin and his ex-wife, Sandra, of Detroit, had three children. If you think the music business had any kind of social conscience in those days, Oates said, youre dreaming.. Ruffin fought drug addiction for more than two decades before finally losing the battle in a Philadelphia crack house. There was no David Ruffin on stage that night. "We are as close as two friends can be." But his fixation on all things youthful may have betrayed something sinister. Despite thriving in the limelight, the Temptations had their share of sour notes. "She thought he was never going to get out of prison," his lawyer Kenneth Burger wrote in a lawsuit. Track outages and protect against spam, fraud, and abuse, Measure audience engagement and site statistics to understand how our services are used and enhance the quality of those services, Deliver and measure the effectiveness of ads, Show personalized content, depending on your settings, Show personalized ads, depending on your settings. He found it at a Salvation Army treatment facility, where he replaced his alcohol habit with a piano habit. the Temptations most popular song, My Girl, a Motown artist who sang What Becomes of the Brokenhearted., California residents do not sell my data request. This was a time of the British Invasion, and the slickly packaged Motown soul was about the only American pop music worth listening to on the radio. Fournier said detectives have determined that Ruffin and a friend left Murrell Limousine Service between 10 and 11 p.m. Friday in a limo the service's owner lent them. A year later, he and The Temptations parted company. "Before he died he should have been aware of how many people loved him.". They watched television. In the long run, that's not how David Ruffin will be recalled. June 3, 1991 12 AM PT Associated Press PHILADELPHIA Former Temptations singer David Ruffin collapsed at a crack house where he had gone in a borrowed limousine in the hours before he died,. A failed attempt at a solo career was made worse by her lawyer, who allegedly embezzled money from her. According to her sister, Ballard was also battered by a violent husband. But beneath DeBarge's musical wizardry was a story of abhorrent abuse. A CLOUDY DAY THE HARD DEATH OF DAVID RUFFIN By Staff Jun 14, 1991 0 SUBSCRIBE: $1 for 3 months ON MONDAY, the streets of downtown Detroit seemed mournfully dark on a humid, cloudy day. Ballard wound up on welfare, and her problems became fodder for the press. It affected him for the rest of his life. Among those hit-makers was James Jamerson. Quincy tried to distance himself from the familys roots in rural Whynot, Miss. She married Cecil Womack, had an affair with his brother, and attempted suicide because of the intense guilt she felt. Early scenes show how the Temptations formed as a group of neighborhood kids in Detroit, just as the city was breaking into the mainstream of music thanks to Berry Gordy's Motown. "David was a fantastic singer and performer." (Otis Williams) When the tall gangly, painfully thin ex-Temptation died last year, we lost a talent the comes so rarely. Crying in tune, thats how I hear Davids voice, Hall said during a recent interview. When he died, Ruffin, who was 6 feet 2. The last time Showers saw Ruffin was a week before he died. Mr. Candi Staton saw in Ruffin a lust for life that could take different forms. Or purchase a subscription for unlimited access to real news you can count on. As the musical jokes, their nickname the Temps eventually obtained a new meaning with a range of members cycling in and out of the band over the years. The Temptations soon reached a higher plane, the stage that Ruffin had fantasized gracing when he was still in Mississippi. David Ruffin's death. She told Ask The Messengers in 2018 that she'd also struggled with drug and alcohol addiction but got clean 18 months after her father passed away.. Ruffin has two sisters, Cheryl Ruffin-Robinson and Kimberly . Investigators are still trying to piece together the 50-year-old Ruffin's last hours. . At age 17 Wells married Motown background singer Herman Griffin. He was 50 years old at the time of his death, as his birth date was January 18, 1941. . About the only one I recognized was Melvin Franklin, mainly because of his distinctive bass voice. He might as well have imagined walking to the moon. Gaye may have had duet success with Mary Wells and Diana Ross, but Terrell really brought out the best in him. "The Temptations" miniseries originally aired on NBC in 1998 and in the years since, many have come to quote the line uttered by actor Leon Robinson's character, David Ruffin. He was the third of four children. In the cruelest, most knife-like of twists it turns out that sometimes people who give the world immense pleasure have gone through a world of pain. Ruffin had smooth moves and massive magnetism. And there never will be again. Sign up for our newsletter to keep reading. An FBI check of fingerprints confirmed the name--and an inglorious end for one of the fabled voices in pop music. Otis Williams, the last surviving original Temptation, once recalled that Ruffin was a lively, funny guy prone to doing cartwheels while they walked down the street, who offered little about his background, no matter how much time the two spent together. News of his death follows reports last month that he was . But he took me with him, and told me that the business aspect of it was not so fun. . Christian Bishop-Torrence and Sage Wright have been charged with capital murder in death of malnourished daughter. People magazine referred to La Toya as the Jacksons' "fallen angel," noting that she fell out of favor by posing for Playboy in her birthday suit and accusing family patriarch Joe Jackson of unspeakable acts in her autobiography. In 1993 and 2003 he was accused of child molestation. He was also utterly petrified of his father, Joe, who used to beat Jackson so badly that the King of Pop later admitted to vomiting and fainting in his presence. Toxicology reports weren't complete from an autopsy conducted Saturday, but acquaintances said his drug problems were well known. Blues And Soul Article: David Ruffin. Music didn't just become KEM's livelihood; it helped save his life. I stand there and look at that painting and think how I had to deal with 24 strong personalities, and here I stand today., The Aint Too Proud musical depicts a warts-and-all look at the group, which not only doesnt sugarcoat their story but acknowledges their trials and tribulations head-on. But to put it bluntly, his greatness as a performer was eclipsed by his horribleness as a person. (renews at {{format_dollars}}{{start_price}}{{format_cents}}/month + tax). David Ruffin, who is celebrated as a Temptations vocalist, died because of a medication glut. He was a very complicated person.. These were insults to an injury-filled life. He was dressed in a green sport shirt, Bermuda shorts and sneakers. But theres something else, too, a gnawing sense that Ruffins legacy was shortchanged by media narratives that focused more on his flaws, and the way in which he died, than his talents. The three issues are laid out on rockandrollparadise.com. Ruffin died of a crack overdose June 1 at age 50. With 14 R&B No 1 singles under their belts (among them: My Girl, The Way You Do the Things You Do, Cloud Nine, Papa Was a Rolling Stone and Get Ready), their music provided a soundtrack to the 60s and early 70s, helping lift up Motown Records in the process. We're talking about "My Girl," "Just My Imagination," "Papa Was a Rolling Stone," and so many wonderful others. He didnt write those songs, but he owned them. There were hints that Ruffins future would be tumultuous. The doomed convertible. . June 1, 1991: David Ruffin died of "an adverse reaction to drugs" - namely cocaine - in a hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. David stayed over a couple extra days to pick up the balance from the promoter, Bowen said. I was in shock, Murrell said. He suffered from sickle-cell anemia as well as alcohol abuse, which served both as a coping mechanism for the punishing touring and recording schedule The Temptations had as well as the pain caused by his medical condition. Drugs came into play and once that happened, dreams and aspirations became fragmented. He was 50 years old.. He wanted to get back to what life was really all about, his niece said. The Funk Brothers didn't earn "enough money to survive without doing graveyard gigs" at clubs. The singers also dated, and while performing for Brown's label Terrell released the single "I Cried," whose title sums up her relationship with the Godfather of Soul. Candi Staton sometimes revisits one of her favorite memories of her old friend. News coverage of his death veered toward the. The way they sang moved me, like probably nobody ever has., When Oates was 19, he and Hall had watched the Temptations from front-row seats at the Apollo, and met the towering Ruffin in a backstage stairwell. But David Ruffin could sing like a hurricane, and possessed an innate sense of how to connect with people, how to make them smile and laugh and feel what he felt. With soaring fame came more pain. Someone dropped off his body in the emergency room of a hospital. According to her daughter, Wells never complained "She only cried." In 1991 a 50-year-old Ruffin collapsed in a crack house and died shortly thereafter at the hospital. While honing his talents after high school he started drinking and ultimately descended into alcoholism. Mary Wells not only cracked the top 10, but two years later she sang Motown's first #1 hit "My Guy." The singer and the salesman stayed in touch after the latter left Motown in 1972, when the firm relocated to Los Angeles. Gordon died in 2005. His bandmates Otis Williams (no relation) and Melvin Franklin weren't surprised,since Williams had reportedly confessed suicidal thoughts to them before. Showing Editorial results for david ruffin. In the miniseries, he was dumped near a hospital and not identified for about a week, seemingly destitute at that point. As he became increasingly uncontrollable he got kicked out of the Temptations. Chico DeBarge, who had a solo career, told Vibe, "My father sexually molested a lot of my brothers and sisters." The 58-year-old Detroiter was admitted to Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oaks on. But his road to success was long and torturous. DeBarge's members were part of the larger DeBarge family, which included a whopping 10 siblings. That pain, according to the Guardian, drove Paul to drink alcohol. Millions tuned in to CBS on Sunday nights to watch Ed Sullivan, and the band was rattled before they performed for his audience except for Ruffin, who didnt break a sweat. I didnt have any idea when we started making this music to just have fun and make money that itd be so emotional for people.. And just as the Beatles grappled with tragedy, the Supremes had their unfair share of sorrow. These are the deadliest national parks in the U.S. Burkina Faso massacre: Survivors accuse government forces. "The son of a strict and sometimes abusive Baptist minister," per Legacy.com, Ruffin terrorized singer and onetime girlfriend Tammi Terrell. After the services, Kendricks was arrested on a warrant accusing him of failing to pay $26,000 in back child support. Robert Smith, pastor of New Bethel, called for a return to the kind of music that made black women feel good about black men., Among the Temptations other hits with Ruffin were Aint Too Proud to Beg, I Wish it Would Rain and Im Losing You.. She would undergo eight surgeries that impaired her memory and left her partially paralyzed. The Five Heartbeats is a 1991 musical drama film directed by Robert Townsend, who co-wrote the script with Keenen Ivory Wayans.Produced and distributed by 20th Century Fox, the film's main cast includes Townsend, Michael Wright, Leon Robinson, Harry J. Lennix, Tico Wells, Harold Nicholas, and Diahann Carroll. He never got over her death. But there was no escaping the racial hatred that coursed through much of the country. PHILADELPHIA, JUNE 2 -- Former Temptations singer David Ruffin collapsed at a crack house where he had gone in a borrowed limousine in the hours before he died, police said today. Best Known For: David Ruffin was an American soul singer who rose to fame as one of the lead singers of the Temptations. Ruffin, 50, was one of the original Temptations. He is one of the most remembered members of the hit '60s group, and will always be remembered as such. Ruffin died of a crack overdose June 1 at age 50. Street View: See the Place Where Temptations Singer David Ruffin Died 20 Years Ago Today. Despite accommodating immense security to keep Ruffin out, they could not stop him . Enter David Ruffin (a . On another occasion, Staton and the singer Bobby Womack visited Ruffin while he was recording new music in California. We know it was the Temptations. "Nobody could sing like David Ruffin," says Martha Reeves of Martha and the Vandellas, one of Motown's top groups. Ruffin helped The Temptations become one of the first R&B acts to achieve "crossover" success with white baby-boomer teens. Our editorial content is not influenced by any commissions we receive. Jimmy Ruffin, the Motown performer who scored his biggest hit with 1966's What Becomes of the Broken Hearted, has died at the age of 78. He signed with Motown and released the Top 10 hit "What Becomes of . Linster Butch Murrell said Ruffin was a friend who sometimes did advertisements for his company and, in return, could use the firms limousines as he did Friday night. In 1970, Gaye's singing partner of three years, Tammi Terrell, died of a brain tumor. If you are experiencing difficulties logging in or are a subscriber getting a paywall, please try one or more of the following steps. uDiscover Music lays out the difficulties he faced that could have led to him to this point. See actions taken by the people who manage and post content. Davis Eli Ruffin (Ruff, The Temptations) was born on 18 January, 1941 in Whynot, Mississippi, USA, is an Actor, Soundtrack. If you choose to Reject all, we will not use cookies for these additional purposes. According to TMZ's report/em>, 48-year-old David Ruffin Jr., was arrested and charged with felony domestic violence early Tuesday morning. The Temptations - David Ruffin's death Scene YSTxLEGENDxx 60 subscribers Subscribe 44K views 2 years ago Since no one made a death scene of David Ruffin or how he died. It was happenstance, Williams says now, who initially found trouble in the city but later found solace in music, later founding the Temptations with its original lineup of Al Bryant, Eddie Kendricks, Melvin Franklin and Paul Williams. Fate drew him back to Philadelphia in the 1980s, when he was far removed from the limelight, and on the other side of an up-and-down solo career. In addition, Williams was recently honored at the Apollo Theaters recent Spring Gala where he was bestowed a spot on the historic Harlem theaters Walk of Fame. Although Ruffin's solo career has many fans with questions of what might have been, time has been very kind to his work and its left an enduring and powerful legacy. He moved to Detroit to become part of the burgeoning Soul Music scene of the early 60s. Nominees for the 2023 Drama Desk Awards have been revealed, with the new Broadway musicals Shucked and Some Like It Hot in the lead with 12 and eight nods, respectively. While the official cause of death was ruled a cocaine overdose, his family has come to believe that foul play was involved. Third, the gun had been fired twice, but only one bullet was lodged inside Williams. When [arranger] Paul Riser added the strings and horns, I came into the studio and Smokey was sitting at the console. They watched television. Connect with the definitive source for global and local news. On stage, the soaring harmonies and stunning choreography added to the group's legend. Things "got so bad that his stamina, his respiratory system started fading on him." "David was thought of as a great soul singer," the Queen of Soul told the gathering, "and today a great soul has gone. When she was a teenager in the mid-1970s, her father took her on the road with him as he toured in support of a hit single, Walk Away From Love., I was interested in singing. But even as the Beatles took the U.S. by storm, the Supremes dominated charts. His family believes his legacy was distorted by media attention on his struggles with addiction. A crowd rushed the church as the service began, and one man had his thumb severed when a door was slammed on it. helped make the '80s feel magical. The last time Bowen spoke to Ruffin was Friday night, when he faxed her a signed contract for a European tour that was to begin this month. In the Bethel AME Baptist Church, Aretha Franklin stood before a sweaty crowd, next to David Ruffin's casket. She would undergo eight surgeries that impaired her memory and left her partially paralyzed. A jukebox musical, based on their rise and told from the perspective of Williams dubbed Aint Too Proud (named after their 1966 signature Aint Too Proud to Beg) debuted on Broadway in March and later garnered 11 Tony nominations, winning for best choreography. When Ballard was 15 her father died, and at 17 she was raped by an acquaintance she had trusted to drive her home. Before long she dropped out of high school, began drinking heavily, and ruined her own career. In The Michael Jackson Tapes, he described feeling deprived of his childhood: "I wanted so badly to play in the park across the street because the kids were playing baseball and football but I had to record. Obsessed with compensating for his lost boyhood, Jackson dubbed his adulthood home the Neverland Ranch and allegedly underwent plastic surgeries to resemble Peter Pan. 1 record, but proved to be so much more a paean to love that has endured for more than five decades. But take heart. Some groups manage to endure with or without members. Never-before-seen. But his family and friends felt his achievements were diminished, when he died, by news coverage that all but blamed him for having struggled with addictions. Several people collapsed inside the sweltering church and had to be carried out. In 1971, a doctor discovered that Williams had dangerously damaged his liver and advised him to retire from music, which Williams did. Sadly, she eventually entered the arms of another abuser: Temptations singer David Ruffin. 25 overall in NFL draft, The prayerful goal for Bills and Sabres owner Kim Pegula: 'Full recovery', Culture wars shift to the school library, including in Western New York. DETROIT (AP) _ David Ruffins old partners in the Temptations got a tearful standing ovation at the Motown singers funeral with a three-man rendition of the groups first No. Within and without the Temptations, David Ruffin's voice . They divorced in 1963 and in 1964 Wells parted ways with Motown because she felt the company underpaid her. Im reading it and it said to give them a call the first chance I had, Williams remembers. "In a larger sense, Ruffin was a metaphor for his music. There werent many paths to wealth and stardom for Black people in Southern states that were still trapped, in the 1940s and 1950s, under the oppressive weight of Jim Crow laws and segregation. She was just 32 years old. Later that year, the group had their first hit, the Smokey Robinson-penned single The Way You Do the Things You Do. When Ruffin was told that the song was climbing the Billboard charts, he burst into tears. Together they performed some of the most riveting love songs of all time, including "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" and "You're All I Need to Get By." Ruffin himself played the oldies circuit and had recently returned from performing in Europe shortly before his death. Ruffin's five years with the Temptations were arguably their best, in a groove combining the classy style and musical foundation of the best early R&B; with the beat of the '60s. Much like the success of the group themselves, Williams' later years are bittersweet: he's left without his bandmates, but is enjoying a. 1991, and David Ruffin's death was ruled as an outcome of a cocaine overdose. Hopelessly lonely, he would keep mannequins around to feel less alone. Kim Owens, better known as KEM, would grow up to be a Grammy-nominated singer and sell millions of albums. The singer died at age 49. Broadway Off-Broadway. Withered by addiction and emotional problems, he had numerous stays at hospitals and mental institutions toward the end of his life. For years he didn't tell his parents about the abuse, and, unaware of why he was acting out, they kicked him out. The Broadway hit Ain't Too Proud, the slam-bang Temptations musical, is coming to the Marcus Performing Arts Center April 5-10.The show reminds me again of the distinctive voice of David Ruffin. Starting in 1964 they had five consecutive #1 hits, proving the Supremes could be every bit as fabulous as the Fab Four. We will treasure the many fond and wonderful memories we all have of him." No details on the cause of. Death 1 Jun 1991 (aged 50) . Unfortunately, Paul didn't stay healthy. Deeply depressed by the loss, he nearly quit the music business. That song plus others like "I Like It" and "Who's Loving Donna Now?" By Ross Scarano. Too sick to perform, Paul had to leave the group. The Philadelphia medical examiner's office has ruled Monday that Temptations singer David Ruffin's death was an accident caused by an adverse reaction to cocaine. Any additional evidence to examine has disappeared into the ether. The Tempts, along with the Supremes, became Motown's biggest acts. You can also visit g.co/privacytools at any time. The group's enduring appeal was enshrined in the 1983 movie "The Big Chill," when the cast danced to "Ain't Too Proud To Beg," one of Ruffin's best vocal turns. If Hendrix, Joplin and Frankie Lymon died of overdoses in the apex of their careers, Ruffin died of the same in his gathering twilight." When he died, Ruffin, who was 6 feet 2 inches, weighed a scarce 125 pounds, a spokesman for the medical examiners office said. In addition to all of these stresses, he was having an affair, and had actually just had an argument with the woman before his death. The Mystery Surrounding The Death Of The Temptations' Paul Williams. "It's going to take a long time to think of David Ruffin without remembering the sordid way he died," critic Dave Marsh wrote in the Village Voice. " Much of the ensuing news coverage treated the details of Ruffins death salaciously. However, some of the viewers considered that scene funny to watch. He had some solo success but never fully succeeded at kicking his drug habit, which hindered his career. Ruffin was excited for new performance opportunities that were opening to him and sliding deeper into addictions gravitational pull. . Things that he wanted to do that I would not approve of -- drugs.". He makes the relationship between Eddie K and David Ruffin seem really intense, more intense than that of Paul Williams and Eddie. According to All Music, Jamerson walked with a limp because of a bicycle accident that left him wheelchair-bound for a year and self-conscious for the rest of his life. Ruffin ventured inside, and somehow got his hands on a microphone. On page 67 of the Detroit Free Press's August 19, 1973 issue, is a short article titled "Former Temptations Singer Found Dead." Reportedly Ruffin had $30,000 in cash on his person at the time of death, 3:55 a.m., . I dont want to get too hippy-dippy about it, but I felt like I was out of my body., They repeated the experience at Live Aid, and then Oates produced a song, One More for The Lonely Hearts Club, that Ruffin and Kendricks recorded for a 1987 album. On June 1, Ruffin collapsed at a crack house in Philadelphia. Otis told Deseret News that Paul sometimes drank "two to three fifths of Courvoisier a day." The Uptown Theater, on North Broad Street, was a prominent point on the circuit, an iconic part of Philadelphias Black community, and a venue where musicians could sometimes look out at an audience and see Black and white concertgoers enjoying music together. Learn How rich is He in this year and how He spends money? Discover David Ruffin's Biography, Age, Height, Physical Stats, Dating/Affairs, Family and career updates. She gets on the phone and told me she was ill and asked: God, dont take me until I speak to Otis Williams. She said she wanted to tell me how much the music meant to her before she died. On May 31 of that year, dressed in Bermuda shorts, white sneakers, and a lime-green shirt, Ruffin climbed into a gray limo that belonged to Murrell, driven by a man named Donald Brown. Ruffin's funeral is scheduled for Saturday at Bethel AME Baptist Church in Detroit, Showers said. They ended up at a property on 52nd Street near Columbia Avenue in West Philadelphia, where Ruffin split 10 vials of crack cocaine with another man, William Nowell, according to reports at that time. According to the Michigan Chronicle, rumor has long held that Ruffin caused Terrell's death by hitting her head with a hammer. David Ruffin's anguished, gospel-bred baritone propelled The Temptations to the top of the charts in the 1960s. Despite launching over a half-century ago, the Temptations and their legend has lately been enjoying fresh relevance. David was doing so well, said Edwards, referring to Ruffins drug problems. There's no business like show business, and there's no sound like Motown's. I always tell people, the world loved the Temptations but the Temptations didnt love themselves. Afterward, she struggled to trust anyone. David Ruffin, reconsidered: 30 years after the Temptations singer's death in Philly, a look at his complicated legacy Ruffin the voice of Motown classics like "My Girl" died at age 50 in 1991. Ruffin, meanwhile, died of a cocaine overdose in 1991. He moved to Philadelphia in 1989, lived with a girlfriend, Diane Showers, and palled around with Linster Butch Murrell, the owner of a small limo service. Looking back on his childhood, KEM told MLive, "I had a lot of what we would call today low self-esteem, childhood depression, anxiety all of the normal things adolescents go through magnified by 50."