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Tesla
Biography
Although Tesla emerged during the glory days of hair metal, they never completely fit the spirit of the times. Their music was well-produced pop-metal, to be sure, but they never indulged in the glammed-up excess that made cartoons out of many of their peers. Instead, Tesla's music was bluesy, no-frills, '70s-style hard rock; it concentrated more on solid musicianship than enormous, arena-ready choruses (or hairdos), and it had a noticeable grit -- not so much the urban sleaze of Guns N' Roses, but a grounded attitude and a genuine affection for old-school hard rock. Despite their refreshing lack of posturing, Tesla was just as hard-hit as the rest of the pop-metal world when grunge wiped out classic-style hard rock, but they did produce one of the more respectable bodies of work of the era.

Tesla was formed in Sacramento, CA, in 1985, out of an earlier, locally popular group called City Kidd which dated back to 1982. Tesla's lineup featured vocalist Jeff Keith, the underrated guitar tandem of Frank Hannon and Tommy Skeoch, bassist Brian Wheat, and drummer Troy Luccketta. At management's suggestion, the band named itself after the eccentric inventor Nikola Tesla, who pioneered the radio but was given only belated credit for doing so.