About Pure Prairie League
Pure Prairie League is an American country rock band which featured in its original lineup, singer and guitarist Craig Fuller, drummer Tom McGrail and steel guitarist John David Call, all from Waverly in southern Ohio. Fuller started the band in 1970 and McGrail named it after a fictional 19th century temperance union featured in the 1939 Errol Flynn cowboy film Dodge City. In 1975 the band scored its biggest hit with the single "Amie", a track that originally appeared on their 1972 album Bustin' Out. Pure Prairie League scored five consecutive Top 40 LPs in the 1970s and added a sixth in the 1980s. They disbanded in 1988 but regrouped in 1998 and continue to perform. The line-up has been fluid over the years, with no one member having served over the band's entire history. The band's most recent line-up consists of Call, drummer Scott Thompson, keyboardist Randy Harper, guitarist Jeff Zona and bassist Jared Camic. Other notable musicians to have played with Pure Prairie League include guitarists Vince Gill, Gary Burr and Curtis Wright.
The band was formed in Columbus, Ohio in 1970 and had its first success in Cincinnati. Craig Fuller, Tom McGrail, Jim Caughlan and John David Call had played together in various bands since high school, notably the Vikings, the Omars, the Sacred Turnips and the Swiss Navy.
In 1970 the first Pure Prairie League line-up was Fuller, McGrail, singer/songwriter/guitarist George Ed Powell , Phill Stokes and Robin Suskind on guitar and mandola, with John David Call joining the band later that year. Call's steel guitar added country credibility to the band's playlist and sparked guitar duels with Fuller that created the signature sound of the band. They rose to popularity as the house band at New Dilly's Pub in the Mt. Adams section of Cincinnati.
In mid-1971, McGrail and Stokes left the band to rehearse with Bill Bartlett , but were unable to put a viable band together. Jim Caughlan, who had played guitar and drums with Fuller, Call and McGrail in earlier bands, took over on drums, and Jim Lanham from California, formerly of The Yellow Payges and Country Funk, replaced Stokes on bass. Suskind departed as well, soon after the arrival of Caughlan and Lanham.
Early on, Pure Prairie League was looking for national artist representation and made contact with a well-known Cleveland based rock and roll promoter, Roger Abramson. At the behest of the group's roadie Jim "Westy" Westermeyer , Abramson saw the band at New Dilly's Pub and later signed them to a management contract. Abramson was able to land a contract with RCA Records. He then placed Pure Prairie League as an opening act with many of the concerts he produced at that time.
Their self-titled first album used a Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post cover, showing a trail-worn cowboy named Luke, who would appear on the cover of every Pure Prairie League recording thereafter. After releasing their debut album in March 1972 and embarking on a nationwide tour, Call, Caughlan and Lanham all left the band.
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