Devo Co-Founder Bob Casale Dies at 61

Bob Casale, one of the co-founders of New Wave band Devo, died Monday of "conditions that lead to heart failure," according to a post on the band's Facebook page. He was 61.

"As an original member of Devo, Bob Casale was there in the trenches with me from the beginning," Casale's brother Gerald wrote in a Facebook post Tuesday. "His sudden death from conditions that lead to heart failure came as a total shock to us all." 

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Gerald Casale founded Devo with Mark Mothersbaugh when they were students at Kent State University in the early 1970s. They both recruited their brothers (both named Bob) to join the band, and Bob Casale was known as "Bob 2" to differentiate him from Bob Mothersbaugh.

Casale served as Devo's guitarist and keyboardist, and also helped to engineer and produce many of its records. The band's biggest hit was "Whip It," from the 1980 album Freedom of Choice.

Devo officially broke up in 1991, but continued to tour sporadically. In 2010, the band released Something for Everybody, its first new album in 20 years.

Casale is survived by his wife and two children.