Rock ‘n’ roll has its stars: The guys and gals who write the hits, jump around in their underwear, and dodge — or don’t dodge — the groupies. Less heralded are their minders — the brave souls who try to make sure they get where they’re going, on time, without getting ripped off by sleazy promoters or falling victim to drug overdoses.

Dennis Sheehan, a longtime tour manager for U2 who died of an apparent heart attack at 68 on Wednesday, was one of the best of these: a legendary tour manager.

“We’ve lost a family member, we’re still taking it in,” Bono wrote on U2’s website. “He wasn’t just a legend in the music business, he was a legend in our band. He is irreplaceable.”

Though he spent decades in a dirty business — including time serving notorious hotel-room trashers Led Zeppelin — Sheehan seemed to emerge spectacularly unscathed.

“I never drank until I was 30, I never did drugs and I was always honest,” Sheehan told Projection, Lights and Staging News in 2008. “I think people knew my history at the time, and knew I was straight and had a sense of responsibility. I always got the job done regardless.”

Born in England, Sheehan grew up in Ireland. He played in a band from 13 to 19, doing some professional touring.

“On the U.S. Army bases we would play ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and they would just throw money on the stage,” he said. “We’d play it a half a dozen times a night! It was good fun.”

But then he made an unusual move — he stepped offstage.

“At 19, I took my first job on the other side of the business,” he said in a 2013 interview.

The job was tour managing for soul greats Jimmy James and the Vagabonds. Sheehan didn’t miss the spotlight.

“I had driven my own band around, and at that point I knew I wasn’t going to miss playing very much,” he said.

Sheehan kept at it, and ended up working for Led Zeppelin manager Peter Grant in the 1970s. Grant, a former wrestler widely regarded as one of the most successful managers in rock history, didn’t suffer fools gladly. At more than 300 pounds, he didn’t have to suffer fools at all.

“He had a particular aversion to album bootleggers, and was once seen out in the audience at a German Zeppelin concert, snatching the tapes from a bootlegger’s machine and tearing them up,” the Independent wrote when Grant died in 1995. “A policeman called to the scene, armed with a gun and an Alsatian dog, took one look at Grant’s enormous bulk and threatening expression and walked away.”

Sheehan had the unenviable task of assisting Grant on Led Zeppelin’s 1975 and 1977 tours.

“We had our own 727 and had a lot of people on the road, including a few undesirables,” Sheehan said of his time with Led Zeppelin.

After Zeppelin, Sheehan transitioned into working with punk and post-punk acts — a transition he called “a great learning curve.” Landing at Arista Records, he did time with Patti Smith and Iggy Pop, among others. And though it’s hard to remember now, a little band from Ireland was sort of punky itself. Sheehan signed on as U2’s tour manager in 1982.

“They had a crew bus and a band bus, and I got rid of both drivers,” he said. “I drove the band and made the crew drive themselves. That saved £40,000 on the European tour!”

“He’s the best in the world. I can’t imagine the last 25 years without him,” U2 manager Paul McGuiness said in 2008. “He has been absolutely fundamental to U2’s success.”

The admiration was mutual.

“There is something extremely special about U2,” he told a band fanzine in 1984. “Whether it be in their social lives, which they are very particular about, or in their business life, which they are also particular about — they go for the best, and in turn the people that work for them give of their best.”

Sheehan was right about U2 being “extremely special.” The band went on to be the biggest in the world, by some estimates. He stuck with the group as it conquered planet Earth — as Bono became a figurehead for humanitarian causes and as the band entered into its alliance with Apple. He even stayed with Bono as a guest of the Clintons in the White House.

Near the end of his life, Sheehan dared offer something road personnel are not known for: optimism about the music industry.

“There are jobs within our industry,” he said in 2013. “There will always be young bands. There will always bands looking for people who want to roadie for them, who want to work alongside them. And that’s your in.”