Gonna sing it to you time and time again.

Gerald Edward Levert of Cleveland, Ohio, the last of a dying breed of pure soul singers, died in his sleep November 10, 2006. He was survived by four children, his mother, two brothers, his sister, and his father, Eddie Levert of the O'Jays. Gerald was 40. He started as a member of LeVert, and had the effervescent 1987 hits "Casanova" and "Just Coolin'" with the trio. There was a successful, if over-hyped, on-and-off stint (1997-2003) as part of supergroup LSG alongside Keith Sweat and Johnny Gill, but Gerald Levert, starting in '91, produced three stellar, platinum-selling solo albums. A prolific songwriter (most notably behind Barry White's 1994 "Practice What You Preach"), he alternately eschewed and courted big-time mainstream popularity. He'll surely remain cherished by his zealous fan base - mostly women too mature for gangsta rap but too young and wanting hunky masculinity to keep after Luther Vandross. Gerald Levert had a smile to end all smiles, and a sense of humor robust and shrewd. Levert liked his food, he liked his cognac, he liked the BeeGees. He had his demons - they showed up in the abandon of his full-bodied tenor and the ferocity of his face when he fell to his knees with a howl. Gerald never was "cool," and though he sometimes wished he was, it was his '70s-style lack of restraint, as opposed to a post-hip hop all-too-self-aware stance, that made us love every pound of him, every "Me and Romeo ain't never been friends." We wonder what dreams may come for Gerald Levert in the sleep of death ("Can't you see how much we really loved you?"), and can only hope they're filled with rhythm and no blues, that he's rocked eternally in what the poets call that cradle of the deep.