CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – Life\u2019s been good for Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Joe Walsh.<\/p>\n
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. <\/p>\n
It didn\u2019t take long for the music world to notice.<\/p>\n
\u201cGuys like Jimmy Page, Led Zepplin guitarist, were like, \u2018Oh my God, who is this guy,\u2019\u201d said longtime friend and former manager David Spero. \u201cPete Townshend, of the Who, when he saw the James Gang, invited them to come and do their European tour.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s absolutely one of the greatest guitar players out there,\u201d Spero added. \u201c(And) he\u2019s an amazing songwriter.\u201d<\/p>\n
But before fame and notoriety, Joe Walsh, born Joseph Fidler in Wichita, Kansas in 1947, came to Northeast Ohio to attend Kent State University.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoe became Joe Walsh in the Cleveland area,\u201d Spero remembered. \u201cKent 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.\u201d<\/p>\n
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 \u201cHotel California\u201d album.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s 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,\u201d said Spero.<\/p>\n
Joe Walsh was inducted into the Rock Hall with the Eagles in 1998 but friends, fans, and colleagues say there should be more nominations.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoe Walsh deserves to be like the Eric Claptons or Neil Youngs, a three-time guy,\u201d said Spero.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe James Gang as a power trio,\u201d he said of other nominations for Walsh\u2019s music like \u201cFunk 49\u2033 and \u201cWalk Away.\u201d \u201cThe stuff he has done as a solo artist has been huge, \u2018Rocky Mountain Way,\u2019 \u2018Life\u2019s Been Good.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Known as \u201cAverage Joe\u201d and \u201cThe Clown Prince of Rock\u201d for some of his antics, Walsh wild side is legendary.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoe had gone out and bought an electric glue gun and proceeded to take everything in his hotel room and glue it on the ceiling,\u201d Spero remembered. \u201cI think that bill was about $59000. So Joe was a bit crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Spero says, at heart, Joe\u2019s just a Northeast Ohio guy.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen Joe looks back on things, he\u2019s so fond of this area,\u201d Spero reminisces. \u201cHome is where the heart is, I think he would say Northeast Ohio.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a good guy,\u201d Spero concludes. \u201cHe has that Northeast Ohio mentality.\u201d<\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 WOIO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – Life\u2019s been good for Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Joe Walsh. He left…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":468050,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[212802,212803,212804,212801,171,59062,28615,975,212800,69209,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-468049","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-cleveland-hall-of-fame","9":"tag-cleveland-rock-and-roll","10":"tag-cleveland-rock-and-roll-hall-of-fame","11":"tag-david-spero","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-hall-of-fame","14":"tag-joe-walsh","15":"tag-music","16":"tag-rock-n-roll-hall-of-fame","17":"tag-the-eagles","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115772432311527190","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=468049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/468050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=468049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=468049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=468049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}