Jeff Paris (born Geoffrey Brillhart Leib) is an American vocalist, keyboardist and guitarist who has primarily performed in the
hard rock
Hard rock or heavy rock is a heavier subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and Distortion (music), distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the Garage rock, garage, Psychedelic rock, psychedelic and blues ...
/
heavy metal genre.
Still performing under the name Geoffrey Leib, Paris began his career as a session musician in the 1970s, appearing on albums by such acts as
Jay Gruska
Jay Gruska (; born April 23, 1952) is an American songwriter and composer best known for his film and television scoring, and for writing hit songs for a variety of artists. He has composed musical scores for dozens of TV dramas, with over 500 ...
(''Gruska on Gruska'') and
Bill Withers
William Harrison Withers Jr. (July 4, 1938 – March 30, 2020) was an American singer and songwriter. He is known for having several hits over a career spanning 18 years, including "Ain't No Sunshine" (1971), "Grandma's Hands" (1971), "Use Me ( ...
(''
Naked & Warm'', ''
'Bout Love''). His initial band was the jazz/soul/disco quartet, Pieces, who released an album in 1979, following which he had a stint with the disco band L.A.X., who released two albums in 1979 and 1980. Meanwhile, he continued writing songs and performing on sessions for other high-profile artists such as
Jeffrey Osborne
Jeffrey Linton Osborne (born March 9, 1948) is an American singer-songwriter, musician and lyricist. He is the former drummer and lead singer of the American R&B/soul group L.T.D. (band), L.T.D., with whom he began his musical career in 1970.
B ...
(
self-titled debut, ''
Stay with Me Tonight'', and ''
Don't Stop'') and
Leon Ware (
self-titled album), the latter a famed
Motown
Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...
songwriter in his own right, throughout the early/mid-1980s.
Beginning in 1984, Paris/Leib branched off in a more hard rock direction as a songwriter and musician, contributing to albums that year by
Lita Ford
Lita Rossana Ford (born September 19, 1958) is an American guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. She was the lead guitarist for the all-female rock band the Runaways in the late 1970s, and then embarked on a successful glam metal solo career tha ...
and
Y&T. His credits included "Gotta Let Go" (Ford) and "Lipstick & Leather" (Y&T). He went on to work as session musician on
Cinderella
"Cinderella", or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a Folklore, folk tale with thousands of variants that are told throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988. The protagonist is a you ...
's 1986 debut album, playing keyboards. Around the same time, he signed with
PolyGram, releasing two solo albums ''Race to Paradise'' in 1986, and ''Wired Up'' in 1987, but both failed to make commercial impact.
In the 1990s, Paris released three more solo albums: ''Lucky This Time'' (1993), ''Smack'' (1997) and ''Freak Flag'' (1998)
and also continued working as a session musician and songwriter.
In this session player/songwriter role, Paris worked with different bands and artists such as, in addition to the abovementioned
Lita Ford
Lita Rossana Ford (born September 19, 1958) is an American guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. She was the lead guitarist for the all-female rock band the Runaways in the late 1970s, and then embarked on a successful glam metal solo career tha ...
and
Y&T, the female rock band
Vixen,
Michael Sembello,
XYZ,
Stevie Salas
Stevie Salas (born November 17, 1964) is an American guitarist, author, television host, music director, record producer, film composer, and former advisor of contemporary music at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. Salas ...
,
Mr. Big, and many others, primarily as keyboardist and backing vocalist. As a songwriter, he co-wrote many hits around late 1980s and early 1990s such as the song "
Waiting for Love," which became a successful single for the band
Alias in the early 1990s. Also, the songs "One Night Alone", "Charmed Life" and "Cryin" from Vixen's
self-titled debut album were all covers of Paris songs, that had originally appeared on his ''Wired Up'' album (a fourth Paris composition, "Give It Away," which he had first featured on ''Race to Paradise'', was also included as a bonus track on the same Vixen album). "Cryin'" became one of the ''Vixen'' album's two big hits (following up their first hit single, "Edge of a Broken Heart"). He also penned the song "Let It Out" for Y&T's ''
Ten'' album and "Road To Ruin," recorded by Mr. Big, who also recorded his song "CDFF-Lucky This Time" for their album ''
Lean Into It''; two years later, Paris re-recorded the latter song for his 1993 album.
Discography
Studio albums
* ''Race to Paradise'' (1986)
* ''Wired Up'' (1987)
* ''Lucky This Time'' (1993)
* ''Smack'' (1997)
* ''Freak Flag'' (1998)
* ''Broken Chain'' (2011)
References
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
20th-century American musicians
{{US-singer-stub