Pablo Cruise

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Pablo Cruise
Pablo Cruise founding members' bow Photo: Floyd J. Jasinski, MYi2U™
Background information
Origin	San Francisco Bay Area
Genres	Pop, Rock, Blue eyed soul
Years active	1973–1986, 1996–present
Labels	A&M Records
Associated acts	Stoneground It's a Beautiful Day Southern Pacific
Website	Official website
Members
David Jenkins Cory Lerios Steve Price George Gabriel
Former members
Bud Cockrell Bruce Day John Pierce Angelo Rossi David Perper Stef Birnbaum

Pablo Cruise is a pop/rock band currently composed of David Jenkins (guitar and vocals), Cory Lerios (keyboards and vocals), Steve Price (drums) and George Gabriel (bass and vocals).

History

Pablo Cruise began in 1973, with former members of Stoneground (Lerios, Jenkins and Price) and It's a Beautiful Day (Cockrell).^[1] The band released its first album in 1975, the self-titled Pablo Cruise.^[2]

Consisting of David Jenkins as vocalist on guitar, Cory Lerios on keyboards and vocals), Steve Price on drums and Bud Cockrell on bass and vocals, the band's first album was a minor success. Their first hit was "Whatcha Gonna Do?" in 1977. This was followed by Other chart hits followed, including "Love Will Find a Way", and "Don't Want to Live Without It" (both 1978); "I Want You Tonight" in 1979 and "Cool Love" in 1981.^[3]

They released their second album in 1976, titled Lifeline. The album achieved slightly higher success than their first, but still only managed to chart at #139 in the United States. 1977's A Place in the Sun was the turning point in the band's career as they finally entered the mainstream music scene. With hit single "Whatcha Gonna Do?" and the title track "A Place in the Sun", the album peaked at #19 on the Billboard charts.

Lineup changes

Bud Cockrell was replaced by Bruce Day in 1977. Day had a short tenure and was replaced himself in 1980 by popular session bassist John Pierce. Also in 1980, the band added Angelo Rossi as an additional guitarist.

In early 1981, Price left suddenly and was succeeded by Donny Baldwin, who had played with Elvin Bishop and would move on to Jefferson Starship by the summer of 1982. David Perper was next to take over the drum throne and Angelo Rossi was replaced by Stef Birnbaum (aka Stef Burns) after just one album. In 1983, the group released Out of Our Hands and toured again that year with another new member, Jorge Bermudez on vocals & percussion. Mostly due to the rising popularity of New Wave, the album struggled with sales.

By the end of 1984, Pierce, Birnbaum, Burns and Bermudez had left.

1985 Reunion

In 1985, the four original members reunited hoping to score a new record deal. It was not to be, however, and the group called it quits in 1986.^[4]

Jenkins moved on to join country rockers Southern Pacific and Lerios worked on movie & TV scores, providing the music for the popular 90s show Baywatch.

1996 Partial Reunion

Around 1996, Jenkins & Cockrell reunited once again as Pablo Cruise. But Lerios, at the time, was not able to rejoin due to his busy sessions schedule and Price was likewise unavailable, so keyboardist Kincaid Miller and drummer Kevin Wells were brought in. Percussionist James Henry joined in 1999 and two additional backup singers, Caroline & Renita, were also recruited (briefly in 2002) for added stage attraction. Drummer Billy Johnson temporarily sat in for Wells in 2002.

2004 to Present

In June 2004, all four original Pablo members were back together again at Steve Price's wedding. This led to three of the four—Jenkins, Lerios and Price—deciding to reconvene permanently. Cockrell was not involved this time and George Gabriel joined on bass and vocals. The band continues to tour, mainly in and around California.

Initially, there were many fans who were left wondering who Pablo Cruise really was. When asked the question, the band, which is a quartet, would answer, "he's the guy in the middle." When asked what Pablo Cruise meant, the band would say that "Pablo represents an honest, real, down to earth individual; and Cruise depicts his fun loving and easy going attitude towards life." ^[5]

Band members

Current members

• David Jenkins – Guitar, vocals (1973–1986, 1996 – present)
• Cory Lerios – Keyboards, synthesizers, vocals (1973–1986, 2004 – present)
• George Gabriel – Bass, vocals (2004 – present)
• Steve Price – Drums (1973–1981, 2004 – present)

Past members

• Bud Cockrell – Bass, vocals (1973 – 1977, 1985 - 1986, 1996 - 2004)
• Bruce Day – Bass, vocals (1977 – 1980)
• John Pierce – Bass, vocals (1980 – 1984)
• Angelo Rossi – Guitar, vocals (1981 – 1982)
• David Perper – Drums, percussion (1982 - 1984)
• Stef Burnbaum – Guitar, vocals (1982 - 1984)
• Jorge Bermudez - Vocals, percussion (1983 - 1984)
• Kincaid Miller - Keyboards (1996 - 2004)
• Kevin Wells - Drums, percussion, backing vocals (1996 - 2002, 2002 - 2004)
• James Henry - Percussion (1999 - 2004)
• Billy Johnson - Drums, percussion (2002)
• Caroline - Backup vocals (2002)
• Renita - Backup vocals (2002)

Albums

Singles

See also

• List of best-selling music artists

References

External links

• Official website