Ohio Players

Ralph Middlebrooks died in November 1997. Poison's most recent record, Hollyweird, was released on May 21 2002. Clarence Satchell died in January 1996 after he had a brain aneurysm. The remainder of the album featured live performances from tours in 1999 and 2000. [1] (http://snopes.com/music/hidden/roller.htm) The band did not discredit this rumor at the time, because, as one band member put it later, "that makes you sell more records.". The record contained five new studio songs: "Power to the People", "Can't Bring Me Down", "Last Song", "Strange", and "I Hate Every Bone In Your Body But Mine". There is also an urban legend that has it that a scream on "Love Rollercoaster" that came before the second verse was the sound of someone being killed in the studio while the track was being recorded. Later in the same year Poison also released Power to the People marking the return of DeVille to the band.

The band became widely known not only for their sound, which has been sampled and copied by countless R&B and hip-hop artists since, but for their sexually provocative album covers, including the cover of 1974's Ecstasy, which featured a man and a woman in a pose of arousal wearing chains and leather, and 1975's Honey, which featured a nude woman holding an overflowing jar of honey and dropping some into her mouth with a ladle. The album, a bright and raunchy series of party anthems, contained few traces of the seriousness of Native Tongue. The group's last big hit was "Who'd See Coo," a #1 R&B hit in August 1976. Crack a Smile was finally released in on March 14, 2000. The band had seven more Top 40 hits between 1973 and 1976, including the smashes "Fire" (#1 on both the R&B and pop charts for two weeks and one week respectively in February 1975) and "Love Rollercoaster" (#1 on both the R&B and pop charts for 1 week in January 1976). The band's supporting tour was equally successful, with its show at Pine Knob Amphitheater in Detroit drawing a sell-out crowd of 18,000. The band’s first big hit was “Funky Worm,” which hit #1 on the Billboard R&B Charts and made the pop Top 15 in May 1973. The record was released in 1996, and went platinum, despite Poison having been out of the spotlight for a number of years.

Bonner sang lead vocals on most of the band's hits. However, Capitol Records had by this time decided to put the album on the back burner and instead decided to release a Greatest Hits record. The band signed with Mercury Records in 1974; by this time their lineup had changed again, with keyboardist Billy Beck instead of Morrison and Jimmy "Diamond" Williams on drums instead of Webster. After his recovery in 1995, the band continued recording. After again reforming with a line-up including Bonner, Satchell, Middlebrooks, Jones, Webster, trumpeter Bruce Napier, trombonist Marvin Pierce, and keyboardist Walter "Junie" Morrison, the Players had a minor hit on the Detroit-based Westbound label in 1971 with "Pain," which reached the Billboard R&B Top 40. Michaels suffered a broken nose, ribs, jaw, and fingers and lost four teeth. The group disbanded again in 1970. Recording was brought to an abrupt halt in May 1994, when Michaels was involved in an accident in which he lost control of his Ferrari.

They then became famous and got better than any group alive. Poison began recording its sixth album, Crack a Smile, in 1994. The group added two more singers, Bobby Lee Fears and Dutch Robinson, and became the house band for New York City-based Compass Records in 1967. Kotzen's future in the band was sealed when it was discovered that he was romantically involved with Rockett's fiance. Kotzen was promptly fired, and replaced by Blues Saraceno. The Ohio Untouchables broke up in 1963, with Ward leaving for a solo career, but the core members of the group returned to Dayton and added Gary Webster (drums) and Leroy "Sugarfoot" Bonner (guitar) in 1964. The record received generally positive reviews, but sales were sluggish. They formed in Dayton, Ohio in 1959 as the Ohio Untouchables, and initially included members Robert Ward (vocals/guitar), Marshall "Rock" Jones (bass), Clarence "Satch" Satchell (saxophone/guitar), Cornelius Johnson (drums), and Ralph "Pee Wee" Middlebrooks (trumpet/trombone). It was a fiery, bluesy rock record, strongly influenced by Kotzen's fresh songwriting contributions and guitar performances.

The Ohio Players are a funk band whose heyday was in the mid- to late 1970s. Poison's fifth album, Native Tongue was released on August 14, 1993. Conflict between Michaels and DeVille cluminated in a fistfight at the MTV Music Awards in 1991, provoked by Deville's inept live performance. Deville was fired and replaced by Pennsylvanian guitar virtuoso Richie Kotzen. Despite Poison's success, DeVille's cocaine and alcohol addictions had begun to cause strife in the band. Poison recorded a number of performances during its 1990/1991 "Flesh & Blood" tour which were released in November 1991 as their fourth album, Swallow This Live.

Flesh & Blood reached #2 on the American charts, providing the impetus for a further World Tour. The record went multi-platinum, spawning three gold singles: "Unskinny Bop", "Ride the Wind" and the ballad "Something To Believe In". Poison's third album, Flesh & Blood (1990), was also highly successful. Ahh! would ultimately place the band alongside Metallica as one of the largest-grossing touring acts of the late 1980s.

Subsequent headlining shows in support of Open Up and Say.. By the time the band toured with David Lee Roth (in 1988 on the Skyscraper Tour,) it was apparent that they had become a major live act. The record included the band's biggest hit, "Every Rose Has Its Thorn", along with other top 10 hits, "Nothin' But A Good Time" and the Loggins and Messina cover "Your Mama Don't Dance". Poison's second album, Open Up And Say...Ahh!, which was released on May 21, 1988 (see 1988 in music) would ultimately go on to sell 8 million copies worldwide.