Jimmy Crespo
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James "Jimmy" Crespo Jr. (born July 5, 1954 in Brooklyn, New York) is perhaps best known as the lead guitarist for the rock and roll band Aerosmith during the period 1979-1984. Crespo has also either played live or appeared on recordings with such artists as Rod Stewart, Billy Squier, Flame, Adam Bomb, Bandaloo Doctors, Meatloaf, The Cutt, Stress, Stevie Nicks, Robert Fleischman, Ian Lloyd and Phoenix.
[edit] Early Life & Career
Crespo was born and raised by Puerto Rican-American parents in Brooklyn, New York. Raised within a musical family, Crespo first took up the guitar at age 14, shortly after forming his first band, The Knoms (phonetically 'Nomes'). Within his teen years Crespo became an accomplished guitarist, drawing on the stylings of such artists as The Yardbirds, Cream, The Beatles, and Jimi Hendrix. Forming the New York club band Anaconda, Crespo was to draw attention on the local scene from industry figures, leading to session work with a number of high profile artists (such as Meatloaf and Stevie Nicks) before Crespo was recruited as lead guitarist to the RCA-signed band, Flame.
Flame was to release two albums, both their eponymous debut in 1976 and 1977's Queen of the Neighbourhood.
[edit] Aerosmith Years
Returning to session work following the breakup of Flame, Crespo was to attract the attention of Aerosmith's management following the departure of Joe Perry from the band in 1979. Invited to audition for the vacant lead guitarist position within the band, Crespo was invited to join Aerosmith in October 1979. Contributing a guitar solo to the song 3 Mile Smile for the already recorded Night in the Ruts album, Crespo commenced touring with the band soon after joining. Despite Crespo's proficiency and many lauded performances, the tour was hampered by the increasingly erratic state of the band's singer, Steven Tyler, at this stage heavily beset by drug addiction and suffering several on-stage collapses.
Despite the singer's troubles, including an incapacitating motorbike accident in January 1981, Crespo and Tyler forged a credible songwriting and touring partnership before the departure of Brad Whitford struck the band in 1981. Crespo was to co-write the majority of songs on Aerosmith's 1982 album Rock in a Hard Place, performing almost all the guitar duties upon the album.
Charting as high as number 36 on the US Billboard chart, Rock in a Hard Place reputedly cost over $1 million in production costs, featuring a plethora of production and engineering staff amongst its credits. One of Aerosmith's hardest sounding albums (Xavier Russell said of it in Sounds: "As soon as the needle hit the wax it melted and the speaker covers blew across the living room floor - Five Stars"), and popular amongst die-hards, the album suffered both from the rejection of those loyal to former guitarist Perry, and from the lack of penetration into the newly emerging MTV video-clip market. The songs themselves were of a surprisingly strong character, many fans (as well as members of the band) to this day regarding them amongst Aerosmith's best.
Subsequent tours throughout 1982 through to early 1984 saw Crespo put in some stellar performances (with Rick Dufay filling in for the absent Brad Whitford), however commercial difficulties during pre-production of the follow-up coupled with singer Tyler's desire to reconvene with guitarist Perry saw Crespo exit the band mid 1984.
Crespo went on to add guitar work to Aerosmith's 1986 album "Classics Live", his performances with the band also heard on the albums "Gems", "Greatest Hits 1972-1988", and upon the box set "Pandora's Box".
[edit] Post Aerosmith
Immediately following his tenure in Aerosmith, Crespo played on releases by Stress and Adam Bomb, the guitarist spending several years with the latter-named Geffen Records signed band. Crespo contributed guitar to the Adam Bomb album "Fatal Attraction" (Geffen 1985) before settling in LA with new wife Cynthia to raise two children. His work with Stress is documented in the bonus tracks added to the CD reissue of Killing Me Night & Day on Deep Shag Records.
He joined bassist Danny Sheridan and Bonnie Bramlett in their new Bandaloo Doctors from 1987 to 1992. Ever on the rock journey, Crespo returned to session work as well as touring and recording with Billy Squier for several years, before joining Rod Stewart's live band as lead guitarist for a highly successful 2-year world tour from 1994-1996.
Continuing to play as a highly respected and successful studio musician, in more recent times Crespo has graced the stages of some of Las Vegas' biggest Casinos, whilst also engineering a rock amplifier simulator ("Rock Amp Legends by Jimmy Crespo") for Nomad Factory. Today Jimmy plays with the band Phoenix, a group of highly talented musicians who have made a strong name for themselves within the Las Vegas entertainment scene.
