CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – Life’s been good for Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Joe Walsh.
He left a local band, the Measles, and replaced guitarist Glenn Schwarts, who moved to California and joined Pacific Gas & Electric, in Cleveland trio The James Gang in 1968.
It didn’t take long for the music world to notice.
“Guys like Jimmy Page, Led Zepplin guitarist, were like, ‘Oh my God, who is this guy,’” said longtime friend and former manager David Spero. “Pete Townshend, of the Who, when he saw the James Gang, invited them to come and do their European tour.”
“He’s absolutely one of the greatest guitar players out there,” Spero added. “(And) he’s an amazing songwriter.”
But before fame and notoriety, Joe Walsh, born Joseph Fidler in Wichita, Kansas in 1947, came to Northeast Ohio to attend Kent State University.
“Joe became Joe Walsh in the Cleveland area,” Spero remembered. “Kent State, while they were playing, learning the game, coming up through the clubs, opening for this act or that act and then becoming a headliner, that all was drinking the Northeast Ohio water.”
He returned to Kent State for May Fourth commemorations and remains close to friends in the area, even after he joined seventies, Southern California supergroup, The Eagles, for their masterpiece, the “Hotel California” album.
“He’s a major part of the Eagles and if people go to see them live, that last half hour, forty minutes of the show is pretty much all Joe,” said Spero.
Joe Walsh was inducted into the Rock Hall with the Eagles in 1998 but friends, fans, and colleagues say there should be more nominations.
“Joe Walsh deserves to be like the Eric Claptons or Neil Youngs, a three-time guy,” said Spero.
“The James Gang as a power trio,” he said of other nominations for Walsh’s music like “Funk 49″ and “Walk Away.” “The stuff he has done as a solo artist has been huge, ‘Rocky Mountain Way,’ ‘Life’s Been Good.’”
Known as “Average Joe” and “The Clown Prince of Rock” for some of his antics, Walsh wild side is legendary.
“Joe had gone out and bought an electric glue gun and proceeded to take everything in his hotel room and glue it on the ceiling,” Spero remembered. “I think that bill was about $59000. So Joe was a bit crazy.”
But Spero says, at heart, Joe’s just a Northeast Ohio guy.
“When Joe looks back on things, he’s so fond of this area,” Spero reminisces. “Home is where the heart is, I think he would say Northeast Ohio.”
“He’s a good guy,” Spero concludes. “He has that Northeast Ohio mentality.”
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