Guitarist Dean DeLeo has enjoyed a professional music career spanning more than 40 years. Today, Aug. 23, 2026, he celebrates a personal milestone as he turns 65.

Born Aug. 23, 1961 in New Jersey, DeLeo co-founded Stone Temple Pilots — formerly known as Mighty Joe Young — in 1989 with his bassist brother Robert DeLeo, drummer Eric Kretz, and the late lead singer Scott Weiland.

The band broke out into the mainstream in 1993 following the slow-burn debut album, Core, released a year earlier in Sept. 1992. Reaching the No. 3 spot on the Billboard 200, Core featured what is arguably one of the band’s most famous tracks, “Plush.”

“Plush” hit the top spot on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Airplay chart (then known as the Album Rock Tracks chart), where it stayed for one week. And the success of the beloved track didn’t stop there. In 1994, “Plush” won a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance, and has since featured in a handful of TV and movie soundtracks, including 2021’s King Richard and an episode of drama series Billions.

The successes kept coming for STP, with several more No. 1 hits, both in the U.S. and overseas, along with three more Grammy nominations. But DeLeo wouldn’t necessarily class himself as a rockstar.

“I’ve got to tell you that term, ‘rock star’, I don’t care much for it,” he told Classic Rock in an interview. “But I never really looked at Scott like that. I looked at him like my brother. He was my brother, and we were in this thing together. We all wanted the same thing – to make an indelible mark on the face of music.”

In 2005, former Major League Baseball pitcher and musician Bronson Arroyo covered “Plush” as part of his cover compilation album, Covering the Bases. He has credited the song for being the track that got him into music.

“I wasn’t really much into music until 1992 when I heard Stone Temple Pilots’ ‘Plush’ on the radio one day when I was sitting in my room when I was about 15,” he told Billboard around the time of the album release. “That song kind of jump started my interest in music because I hadn’t heard anything that sounded like it before.”

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This story was originally published by Parade on Aug 23, 2026, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.