Paul Williams, Rolling Stone writer, founder of Crawdaddy! magazine and the “Godfather of Rock Criticism,” died on March 27th. Williams began Crawdaddy! magazine in 1966 while he was just a student at Swarthmore College. The magazine was influential because of its focus on music journalism, something that was pretty unheard of in the publishing worldat the time. He later went on to pursue a prolific career as a writer; he authored over 25 books and wrote a popular Rolling Stone feature on now-classic sci-fi writer Philip K. Dick in 1975. Williams authored many well-known books about music, including 1969’s Outlaw Blues: A Book of Rock Music, 1973’s Das Energi and his three-part series Bob Dylan: Performing Artist. Williams eventually returned to Crawdaddy! and ran a revival of the magazine from 1993 to 2003. In 1995, he was injured in a bicycle accident, which brought on early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Williams died last night around 10:30 p.m. in Encinitas, Ca., from complications related to his 1995 brain injury. He was 64 years old.