Streets was an American

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...

band made up of singer/keyboardist Steve Walsh, guitarist

Mike Slamer Michael Chetwynd Slamer is a British guitarist. Biography Slamer started his career playing in the UK prog-rock band City Boy. Since then, he has worked as a staff composer for various movies and TV series, has been a session guitarist for nu ...

, bassist

Billy Greer Billy Greer (born January 26, 1952) is an American musician, singer and songwriter known as the current bass guitarist for the band Kansas. He joined the band in their 1985 reformation, making his debut appearance on ''Power''. He had previously ...

, and drummer Tim Gehrt. They formed in 1982 in

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

, United States. Steve Walsh had been in the band

Kansas Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the ...

and Mike Slamer has been in several other bands, including Britain's City Boy. He was also a session guitarist. Greer and Gehrt were regional players who had seen success with bands in Tennessee and Atlanta, respectively. Gehrt was working with ex- Deep Purple bassist Glenn Hughes when Walsh recruited him for Walsh's first solo effort, ''

Schemer-Dreamer ''Schemer-Dreamer'' is the first solo album by Steve Walsh, the original keyboardist/vocalist of the progressive rock band Kansas. It was released in 1980. Although this is his solo album, it features other members of Kansas including Kerry Livgr ...

''. Walsh had noticed him when one of Gehrt's earlier bands had opened for Kansas. The two became friends and eventually spoke of forming a band together. Slamer had never met Walsh until he showed up for the audition. "I decided that I wanted to move to America," says Slamer. "The kind of music that I wanted to make wasn't being played at all in England, so I came here." Streets made its debut performance at

Charlie Daniels Charles Edward Daniels (October 28, 1936 – July 6, 2020) was an American singer, musician, and songwriter. His music fused rock, country, blues and jazz, pioneering Southern rock. He was best known for his number-one country hit "The De ...

' annual

Volunteer Jam The Volunteer Jam is a sporadically-held concert series headlined by the Charlie Daniels Band, featuring a multitude of musical acts that perform onstage with the band. It was first held on October 4, 1974, at the War Memorial Auditorium in Nashvi ...

in January, 1983. The band played on another band's equipment and only played four songs. The debut LP was released later that year on

Atlantic Records Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over its first 20 years of operation, Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most i ...

. "We got out there and proved that we could play," said Walsh. "We go out there and we did damn good. We proved to ourselves that we could pull it off and that we were on the right track. Starting over was very humbling. But we got a lot of good feedback to the album. We were playing live every night and being onstage (was) very renewing for us..." "I wanted to form a democratic band," said Walsh. "I did not want to be a solo singer with a band of sidemen. I like being in a band... I couldn't have done (that project) alone. I needed the help of every musician involved. We were all of equal importance in the creation of the final song." The band later recorded its second album, ''

Crimes in Mind ''Crimes in Mind'' is a 1985 album by Streets. Track listing Personnel * Steve Walsh - synthesizer, keyboard, lead vocals *Tim Gehrt - percussion, drums, vocals *Billy Greer - bass, vocals *Mike Slamer - guitar The guitar is a fretted ...

'', in 1985. Soon after, Streets disbanded. A year later, Walsh rejoined Kansas.

Members

* Steve Walsh – lead vocals, keyboards *

– guitar *

– bass, vocals * Tim Gehrt – drums, percussion, vocals

Discography

Studio albums

* '' 1st'' (1983) * ''

'' (1985)

Live albums

* ''

King Biscuit Flower Hour Presents Streets ''King Biscuit Flower Hour Presents Streets'' is a 1983 recording of a Streets concert. The album features Streets live on their first tour, which was in support of the debut album on Atlantic Records. While the band featured the familiar voice ...

'' (1997)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Streets American hard rock musical groups Rock music groups from Georgia (U.S. state)