New Zealand-born guitarist Spencer P Jones, who rose to fame as a member of The Johnnys and The Beasts Of Bourbon, has been diagnosed with inoperable liver cancer, with the music icon being given a prognosis of “less than six months”.

As The Music notes, Jones’ wife Angie recently shared the devastating news on the Facebook page for Spencer P Jones & The Escape Committee, explaining that the musician was diagnosed with a cancerous tumour back in March.

“Its been a tremendous shock including to us, his immediate family & the doctors. We are still processing this news,” Angie wrote. “The sad news is, that currently there are no treatments available for Spence due to the complexity of the tumor’s position.”

“Spence & I plan to fight this to the end. We plan to beat the prognosis of less than 6mths.”

Back in 2016, a benefit gig was arranged for Jones who was forced to quit playing music as a result of some serious health issues. While things had begun to look up once again, this news appears to have taken everyone by surprise.

“An unfortunate & surprise shock diagnosis has caught us out after assuming all was going well for the past 2 1/2 years whilst being treated for Liver Disease,” explained Angie Jones.

Spencer P Jones also performed at the benefit of Beasts Of Bourbon bandmate Brian Hooper back in March, though his diagnosis was not made public at the time, possibly due to Hooper’s ill health as well.

“Spencer was very ill at Brian’s Benefit gig so to watch them both get up and smash out some Beasts Of Bourbon songs was a miracle in itself,” Angie explained. “It’s been such a hard year for all of us.”

A GoFundMe campaign was set up earlier today which hopes to help “raise some money to help with their ongoing living & medical costs along the way,” and has so far attracted well over $2,000 in donations.

Spencer P Jones first rose to fame back in the early ’80s in Melbourne with bands such as Cuban Heels and North 2 Alaskans, before joining Sydney-based band The Johnnys.

Forming the Beasts Of Bourbon in the mid ’80s, Jones has also worked with a vast array of Aussie music icons, including Paul Kelly, Maurice Frawley, Chris Bailey, and Kim Salmon, and was last performing in Spencer P Jones & The Escape Committee until his 2016 illness.

Our thoughts go out to Spencer P Jones, his family, friends, and everyone else who has been touched by his music at this difficult time.

Check out Spencer P Jones with the Beasts Of Bourbon on ‘Chase The Dragon’:

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