Ronnie Montrose And Friends>>MONTROSE - USA

Montrose - 1973 - Warner
Paper Money - 1974 - Warner
Warner Brothers Presents... - 1975 - Warner
Jump On It - 1976 - Warner
Mean - 1987 - Enigma

Montrose image
  
 
Members
Vocals
Mobile Home Blues Band, Johnny Fortune, Cotton, Salt And Pepper, Big Bang, Manhole, Skinny, Chickenfoot, California, Justice Brothers, Thunderstick>>Sammy Hagar>>Solo, Van Halen, HSAS, The Waboritas, The Wabos, Chickenfoot - Swan>>Bob James>>Swan, Magnet, USSA - Buster Brown>>JONNY EDWARDS>>King Kobra, Northrup, Foreigner, Royal Jelly

Guitar
Van Morrison, Edgar Winter, Boz Scogg’s>>RONNIE MONTROSE>>Gamma, Solo

Bass
Bill Church>>Hagar - Alan Fitzgerald>>Gamma, Sammy Hagar, Nightranger, Alliance - The McCoys, Jimmy Hendrix, Edgar Winter>>Randy Jo Hobbs

Drum
Denny Carmassi>>Sammy Hagar, Gamma, Heart, David Coverdale, Mercy - Black Sheep, Buster Brown>>JAMES KOTTAK>>Kingdom Come, Krunk, Solo, Wild Horses, McAuley Schenker, Scorpions, Solo, The Foundry

Keyboard
JIM ALCIVAR>>Gamma




History & Biography
Montrose was a California-based heavy rock band featuring Ronnie Montrose on guitar and future Van Halen singer Sam Hagar on vocals. Montrose was a session player with a gift and had most recently played with Edgar Winter. Ronnie was forging ahead on his own and looking for a singer. The group was formed in 1973 after Hagar knocked on Ronnie’s door in Sausalito across the bay near San Francisco.

Rod Templeman who would also produce Van Halen’s debut produced the band’s debut. He was a contact of Ronnie’s who had worked with Van Morrison and Templeman. Fitzgerald would appear on Paper Money. The act garnered opening slots for the likes of Humble Pie and Aerosmith. Humble Pie and Montrose shared a manager. At one point, Humble Pie’s drug addict singer Steve Marriott would steal $40,000 from the Montrose coffers, according to Hagar. The band would tour USA, Canada and Europe and open for The Who in London, England in 1974. The band was both headlining and opening shows in Europe, among others for Doobie Brothers. Hagar would relate that the band was making money, but not enough to cover their costs. Seeking answers, Hagar suggests they step it up image and show-wise. This did not go over well with Ronnie who was a ‘denim’ man. Montrose would tell Hagar that he was quitting and ending the band. Instead, Montrose would forge ahead with a new singer. Hagar would end up on unemployment and penniless. The silver lining was that he took music he had written for the next Montrose album to his debut solo album. Fitzgerald would soon join him.

Hagar and Montrose would reconcile their differences twenty years later, but at that point a war of words ensued. The last two records would feature keyboardist Alcivar and were produced by Aerosmith’s producer, Jack Douglas. Hobbs played bass on the last record, but the group toured without a bass man. The band was successful, but did not outlive James’ departure. Montrose had toured with Journey and Van Halen in the USA in March and April of 1978. Several band members would resurface in the short-lived Gamma, which was a Montrose-lead progressive rock band. Church joined Sammy Hagar’s solo band.

All good things follow a clichéd routine and Mean was a reformation record with Edwards on the mike and James Kottak on drums. Ronnie and Sammy would make up and appear on Hagar’s Marching To Mars album of 1997. Church and Carmassi were there too. Montrose committed suicide in 2012. He was afflicted with cancer. The rest of the band recruited Joe Satriani – with whom Hagar was in Chickenfoot (Sammy had been in a completely different Chickenfoot very briefly before Montrose) – and farewelled Ronnie in San Francisco in a Montrose final gig. This became a DVD. A memorial event for guitarist Ronnie Montrose would be held on January 23rd, 2016. The event, Ronnie Montrose Remembered, would be held at the Observatory in Santa Ana, California, USA and was featuring many musicians. The Ronnie Montrose Remembered concert took place at the M3 Live Anaheim Event Center in California, USA on Friday, January 25th. Members of Whitesnake and Dokken were in attendance. Singer Robert "Bob" James died from stomach ulcer at the beginning of 2021. Srummer James Kottak, who was an alcoholic, died in Louisville, Kentucky on January 9th 2024. He was 61.


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