Chip Taylor, &x27;Wild Thing&x27; writer and Angelina Jolie&x27;s uncle, dies at 86 KiMi Robinson, USA TODAYTue, March 24, 2026 at 11:19 PM UTC 0 Chip Taylor, the "Angel of the Morning" and "Wild Thing" songwriter whose family members include brother Jon Voight and niece Angelina Jolie, has died. He was 86. The singer – born James Wesley Voight – died Monday, March 23, according to his label, Train Wreck Records. "RIP: Chip Taylor, my friend and songwriting mentor, last night in hospice," Vera wrote in a March 24 social media post. USA TODAY has reached out to Jon Voight and Jolie for comment.
Chip Taylor, 'Wild Thing' writer and Angelina Jolie's uncle, dies at 86
KiMi Robinson, USA TODAYTue, March 24, 2026 at 11:19 PM UTC
0
Chip Taylor, the "Angel of the Morning" and "Wild Thing" songwriter whose family members include brother Jon Voight and niece Angelina Jolie, has died. He was 86.
The singer – born James Wesley Voight – died Monday, March 23, according to his label, Train Wreck Records. "RIP: Chip Taylor, my friend and songwriting mentor, last night in hospice," Vera wrote in a March 24 social media post.
USA TODAY has reached out to Jon Voight and Jolie for comment.
Taylor, the youngest of three sons, was born in Yonkers, New York, in 1940. His older brothers are volcanologist Barry Voight and Oscar-winning "Coming Home" actor Jon Voight.
Singer and Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee Chip Taylor is photographed at his home in Hartsdale, New York, on Jan. 27, 2019.
After British rock band The Troggs recorded his track "Wild Thing," it shot up the Billboard Hot 100 chart, topping it in 1966. In 2019, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame for its "lasting qualitative or historical significance."
It also played a part in an iconic moment in music history when a kneeling Jimi Hendrix doused his guitar with lighter fluid, set it on fire, and finished it off with a few smashes to close out the Jimi Hendrix Experience's set at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967.
1 / 0Passages 2026 – Chuck Norris, Nicholas Brendon, more stars we lost
Nicholas Brendon, the actor beloved by fans as Xander Harris on seven seasons of TV's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," died March 20. His family said in a statement that star, 54, died in his sleep of natural causes.
"We are heartbroken to share the passing of our brother and son," the family wrote on Brendon's official Facebook page, asking for privacy "as we grieve his loss and celebrate the life of a man who lived with intensity, imagination and heart."
The actor was nominated for several Saturn Awards during his "Buffy" run and also appeared as FBI technical analyst Kevin Lynch on "Criminal Minds."
After "Buffy," Brendon had numerous health difficulties and struggled with substance abuse. He was in treatment to manage his diagnosis and "he was optimistic about the future," his family wrote.
Taylor's songs have made it on the soundtracks of 200 films and TV shows, according to IMDB, including "Deadpool & Wolverine" and "Jerry Maguire" ("Angel of the Morning"), the 2019 animated "Addams Family" movie ("Wild Thing") and the Netflix series "Sex Education."
He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2016, and his brothers accompanied Voight to the ceremony.
Advertisement
Chip Taylor wrote songs about 'soulmate' Joan, cancer treatment
His most recent project was an album titled "Words From Holy Gardens," released in February and inspired by his late wife.
He first met Joan Voight (née Frey) at the Leewood Golf Club pool in Eastchester, New York, when they were teenagers, according to her obituary. Soon after, a 16-year-old Taylor (who goes by Wes Voight) created his first record, "Little Joan." They married in 1964, had two children, Kristian and Kelly and divorced. Though they "spent several decades apart," the two were "always connected." Realizing they were "soulmates," the two decided to remarry following Joan's health scare in 2008.
Joan died in June 2025.
Jon Voight, Chip Taylor and Barry Voight attend the Songwriters Hall Of Fame's 47th annual induction and awards ceremony at the Marriott Marquis Hotel on June 9, 2016, in New York City.
A month and a half later, Taylor released one of the many songs he'd written for her over the years.
"At Joan's funeral, our whole family sang a song that I wrote for her 30 years ago - Only One Joan. Since it has never been available on Spotify and the other streaming services, it seemed like a good time to put it out," he wrote on social media on Aug. 1.
A prolific writer into his final years, Taylor's projects largely drew from his personal life; he released the 10-track "Son of a Golf Pro" in 2025, which he said was recorded "several years ago" but "got lost in the shuffle," and "Behind The Sky" the prior year – "an album largely based on the radiation [and] chemo treatment I've been going through recently," he shared in April 2024.
In December 2022, Taylor announced the cancellation of a tour in Europe due to a diagnosis of "treatable" throat cancer.
"During those 2 months [of treatment] I wrote a bunch of songs hoping that I would be able to sing them if the treatment was successful," Taylor wrote in March 2024. "With the help of my family and wonderful doctors and nurses, I regained enough of my voice to return to the studio with a full band - John Platania, Goran Grini, Tony Mercadante and Tony Leone - and recorded the whole album in a matter of days."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Chip Taylor dead – Angelina Jolie's uncle, 'Wild Thing' writer was 86
Source: "AOL Entertainment"
Source: Entertainment
Published: March 24, 2026 at 07:45PM on Source: PRIME TIME
#ShowBiz#Sports#Celebrities#Lifestyle