Sweet Produced Monster Hits Including Ballroom Blitz, Fox On The Run, Love Is Like Oxygen, Little Willy, Hellraiser, Teenage Rampage, Blockbuster And Action.
LOS ANGELES, CA—May 5, 2008—Popular rock band Sweet led by bassist /vocalist Steve Priest will begin their “Are You Ready Steve?” 2008 tour their first in many years, it was announced today. The original Sweet was formed by Priest along with vocalist Brian Connolly, drummer Mick Tucker and guitarist Frank Torpey (later replaced by Andy Scott) in the UK and rose to fame with such hits as Ballroom Blitz, Fox on the Run, Love is Like Oxygen, Little Willy, Hellraiser, Teenage Rampage, Blockbuster, Action and many others. The 2008 Sweet tour will be a tribute to Connolly and Tucker whose tragic deaths were terribly pre-mature.
According to Edna Gundersen’s story on the cover of the Life section in USA Today on May 2, 2008: “A blitz may be coming to your local ballroom. Bassist Steve Priest, a founding member of Sweet, has reconstituted the glittery fuzz-rock band that ignited U.K. and U.S. charts with such ‘70s hits as Ballroom Blitz, Little Willy, Fox on the Run and Love Is Like Oxygen. The Are you Ready Steve? Tour kicks off June 12 at The Whisky in Hollywood, with guitarist Stuart Smith, singer Joe Retta, drummer Richie Onori and keyboardist Stevie Stewart…Priest’s reconfiguration plans to revisit all the historic Sweet spots, including Blockbuster, Action, Hellraiser and Teenage Rampage.”
Steve Priest was born in Hayes, England and formed Sweet while still a teenager in 1968. The band worked with the songwriting team of Nicki Chinn and Mike Chapman on their early pop hits “Funny Funny,” “Little Willy” and Wig-Wam Bam.” Sweet, began writing the B-sides of their singles and found that the fans were attracted to those harder rock songs. “Blockbuster” was a number 1 hit in 1973 and went platinum. “Sweet continued to chart with Chinn and Chapman compositions including the Top Ten hits “Hell Raiser, “Ballroom Blitz, “Teenage Rampage and The Six Teens. They tour extensively and were renowned for Priest’s outrageous antics on their TV appearances. ”Ballroom Blitz” was put on the American version of the platinum-selling “Desolation Boulevard” album and reached the top 5 in the States in 1975. The “Give Us A Wink” CD came out in 1976 featuring the top 5 “Fox On The Run” and Top 20 “Action” singles. “Fox On The Run” was the band’s first self-penned hit single in the UK and reached 2 on the charts. “Give Us A Wink” continued the groups move towards album oriented rock and reached gold sales in America. Sweet bounced back onto the charts in l978 with the Top 10 US and UK single, “Love Is Like Oxygen,” from their “Level Headed” album which featured Priest supplying lead vocals on “California Nights.” The group carried on for three more albums and then broke up in l981 performing their last live show with the original lineup at Glasgow University on March 20, 1981. Priest subsequently formed a band with guitarist Marco Delmar and drummer Steve Missal called “The Allies” in New York City. Their song “Talk To Me” was featured in the movie, “Fast Food.” He worked with Stuart Smith in the late 80s in Los Angeles. In 1996 Priest published his autobiography “Are You Ready Steve?” which was a raw expose of his time in Sweet and in 2006 released Priest Precious Poems, a CD of tracks largely comprised of his more recent material.
Stuart Smith was born in York, England and was classically trained on guitar from the age of 7. He was mentored by Deep Purple's Ritchie Blackmore and played with Priest in the late 80's. Smith joined Keith Emerson’s band “The Aliens of Extraordinary Ability”, before forming his own band Heaven & Earth in 1997. In 1998 Smith released a critically acclaimed album called "Heaven & Earth featuring Stuart Smith" with guest appearances by Richie Sambora (Bon Jovi), Glenn Hughes (Deep Purple), Joe Lynn Turner (Rainbow), Kelly Hansen (Hurricane/Foreigner), Carmine Appice (Rod Stewart/Jeff Beck/Vanilla Fudge), Bobby Kimball (Toto) and Priest. In 2004, the album won “Best Overall Album of the Year” at the “Los Angeles All Access Music Awards” and Stuart won the “Best Guitarist” award, a feat he repeated the following year.
Richie Onori was born in LA and as a session and sideman has worked with Rick Derringer, Richie Sambora, Bobby Kimball (Toto,) Larry Carlton, Steve Hunter (Alice Coper, Peter Gabriel,) Gary Ritchrach (REO Speedwagon,) Robbie Krieger (The Doors) and Rick Zunigar from Stevie Wonder, to name a few. Onori played with Smith in “The Aliens of Extraordinary Ability” and “Heaven & Earth.” In his earlier career he was part of a popular LA progressive rock band, Satyr. His recently won All Access Magazine’s award for Best Male Drummer.
Joe Retta is the powerhouse lead vocalist for the new lineup. This Rochester N.Y. front man didn’t start singing until the age of 19. Raised on 70s R&B and Rock, a time when he says; “music had more soul and was more diverse” An excellent imitator, this Rock and Soul vocalist made a living singing in tribute acts. Singing the styles of Stevie Wonder, to Robert Plant, Freddy Mercury, Paul Rogers and the great Ronnie James Dio. In fact Joe and his “holy Diver” band played for Ronnie himself at Dios record release party in 2005. During a Canadian radio interview in 2007 Robert Plant said,” This is the best guy to ever sing my stuff!” Taking time off in the early 90s to be a single dad Joe left the LA scene for a time. Joe did mostly recording work for commercials and movie soundtracks. Also recording an album with Miami Sound Machine.
Eventually he was out touring again with members of Santana, Journey, Foreigner and Weather Report, he is back in the mix, jamming of late with members of Toto, Guns and Roses ELP, The Cars, and Heart and now joining forces in The Sweet Band.
Stevie Stewart brings his formidable keyboard skills and vocals styling’s to round out the group. This Minneapolis native performed with blues-rock band Crow best known for their Top 20 hit “Evil Woman (Don’t Play Your Games With Me.) In 1992 he relocated to LA where he performed and produced more than a dozen albums by various artists in all genres. He teamed with Nick St. Nicolas of Steppenwolf as the keyboardist for the “World Classic Rockers” which also featured former members of The Eagles, Santana, Toto, Boston, Wings, Vanilla Fudge, Journey, Foreigner, The Knack and The Spencer Davis Group.
Fans of the group can look forward to hearing all the hits, and more, played as they were meant to be heard, with an energetic stage show that will be second to none.
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Check out out new bling "SWEET" t-shirts modeled here by our official band mascot, the beautiful "Penthouse Pet of the Year", TAYA PARKER who is also starring in VH1's Rock of Love. You can find Taya in our top friends, the t-shirts you can find in the store on the bands main page at www.thesweetband.com
Thanks for your friendship. We are a record label online shop and a social network all in one so join us as a friend on our official site. Peace, Love and Revolution Nick
Great to see you are keeping the dream alive. I see you are coming to Australia, but no sign of venturing to the most remote capital city in the world "PERTH" Western Australia. I bet you would get a warm welcome:)
PS: We just give you the link to the iTunes store above as we hate long link lists. But the songs are also available on AmazonMP3.com, musicload.de etc.
Thanks for the add and giving us a chance! We are six hard working, passionate, down-to-earth, crazy guys creating the music that we love! Free Spirit is a hardworking and equally hard playing rock band hailing from Finland.Our music offers strong musicianship, soulful vocals and the essence of the great acts from the rock scene. Undercurrents of Celtic and folk music blend seamlessly with powerful guitars, souring harmonies and melodies that will get stuck in your head for days at a time; a wound healed only by listening to more and more, quenching the thirst of a Free Spirit hit.
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