September 29: Mike Pinera of Blues Image and Iron Butterfly is 65-years-old today.

Mike Pinera started professionally in the late 1960s as founder and front man with the group the Blues Image, which had a #4 hit in the middle of 1970 with their song "Ride Captain Ride." After the breakup of that group, he was recruited by Iron Butterfly and shared in the on-going creation of the group's sound and monster hit "In a Gadda Da Vida." (Non-slurred; "In the Garden of Eden.") 

Mike later formed the group Ramatam. Pinera was then the founding member of the band New Cactus, a later incarnation of the band Cactus.

He was the guitarist for Alice Cooper from 1980-1983. He appeared and jammed with such groups as Led Zepplin, Yes, Emerson Lake and Palmer, Eric Clapton and the Cream, The Who, Santana, Jimi Hendrix and many more. He did a tour of duty with Alice Cooper recording two albums and several world tours. Many of the Cooper shows he opened as the Mike Pinera Band and then would return later in the show to play with Alice.

Mike formed The Classic Rock All Stars, playing guitar with former Sugarloaf organist Jerry Corbetta, drummer Pete Rivera of Rare Earth, and the bass player from Cannibal and The Head Hunters. He still tours the country performing the hits of those respective bands.

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