Artist Profile

  • Cream

    Cream was the brainstorm of drummer Ginger Baker. He had been toiling away with several British Blues and Jazz outfits, including the Graham Bond Organization where he played with bassists Jack Bruce. But the two never seemed to click. Meanwhile, guitarist Eric Clapton had split from the Yardbirds because the band had ditched its Blues…

  • David Bowie

    Like so many young musicians, David Jones was in and out of a number of unmemorable bands. But it was while he was a member of the Lower Third that David Jones changed his name to David Bowie to avoid any confusion with a fellow Brit with the same name who was appearing in the…

  • Blue Oyster Cult

    Hailing from Long Island, Blue Oyster Cult formed in ‘70 and managed to land a recording contract in ‘72. On the way, they became a regular opening act for Alice Cooper. The starting line-up had Eric Bloom (vocals, “stun” guitar, keyboards and bass), Donald Roeser a.k.a. Buck Dharma (vocals, keyboards, bass, regular guitar – no…

  • Godsmack

    Godsmack, a name lifted from an Alice In Chains’ song, released “Faceless” (’03), “IV,” (’06) and “The Oracle” (’10) – three consecutive #1 albums on the Billboard 200. The band has had over a dozen songs top the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. As Strip Mind and Lillian Axe bit the dust in ’95 vocalist Sully Erna…

  • Alice Cooper

    This is the story of how good kids, from presumedly good families, went horribly wrong. One might ponder how a band of Phoenix, AZ high school buddies who possessed a knack for cranking out third rate Rolling Stones, The Who and Yardbirds covers could, over time, devolve into the founders of Shock Rock. First as…

  • Black Veil Brides

    The video for “Knives And Pens” scored nearly 12 million YouTube views which in turn moved about 20,000 Black Veil Brides T-shirts out of Hot Topic outlets. “I wanted to make the next Motley Crue or KISS,” frontman Andy Six (Biersack) told Billboard. “I had a very specific vision of what I wanted to do…

  • Soundgarden

    The most unsettling aspect of Grunge was the death toll – either by drug overdose or suicide. The list includes Kurt Cobian (Nirvana), Layne Staley (Alice In Chains), Mike Starr (Alice In Chains) and the one that seemed most unlikely of all, Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell. Soundgarden’s initial line-up had lead singer Cornell, guitarist Kim Thayil,…

  • Aerosmith

    Aerosmith’s self-titled debut didn’t do much in 1973 nor did the single “Dream On” (it would rise from the ashes a couple years later). A second effort, “Get Your Wings,” also initially failed to garner much attention even though it had “Same Old Song And Dance.” “Toys In The Attic” hit the streets in 1975…

  • Tool

    Bassist Paul D’ Amour and guitarist Adam Jones came to Hollywood, the land of eternal promise, to get jobs in the movie biz. But they ended up forming Tool in the early 90’s with the addition of Danny Carney on drums and vocalist Maynard James Keenan. Undertow First out of the box was the EP…

  • Yes

    Loading their songs with rapid-fire chord changes (“Roundabout”), key changes (playing in one key is just too restrictive) and time changes (they weren’t content with 4/4), Yes set out to be groundbreakers. Jon Anderson’s airy vocals battled with guitarist Steve Howe and keyboardist Rick Wakeman for attention. No band could pull off what Yes attempted…