Michelle Tardif, aka Mimi Tardif or Mimi (Re)Tardi was a talented young Montrealer who was raked over the coals in American media after her death, which was part of a larger-than-life tragedy involving American celebs.
Tardif started as a Montreal alt media writer with a ton of flash and panache who flamed out in the Arizona desert in a drug binge with her husband Cris Kirkwood, who had attained considerable notoriety as star of the punk rock band The Meat Puppets.
Tardif wrote for the Montreal Mirror and penned a memorable cover-story profile of Maurice "Mad Dog" Vachon, which became an early iconic cover for the fledgling paper.
The photo below shows Tardif hanging around the Bar B Barn with Iggy Pop.She was quite drunk at the time, according to her friend, the noted illustrator Rick Trembles, who supplied these pics. (Trembles, by the way is a straight arrow who has never taken drugs, so don't blame him for what happens next).
So Tardif ended up befriending Cris Kirkwood and the two married in 1995, when Cris was around 35. The two spent increasing amounts of time and effort and energy and money into consuming heroin and crack. So when she was found dead of an overdose in August 1998 it was sad but not a shock.
Cris then went further down the drug spiral alone while various alt-weekly press wrote long and detailed articles describing the epic demise of the couple.
In December 2003 he butted into a dispute between a security guard and a woman over a parking space in Phoenix. Curt hit the guard in the head with a baton and the guard shot him in the back. He recovered and was given two years in prison.
Cris appears to have recovered but the band's big moment in the sun - the early nineties when they were saluted by Grunge God Kurt Cobain - had already passed.