Don Brewer - Grand Funk Railroad

Grand Funk Railroad

In 1968 Brewer left Terry Knight and the Pack along with bandmate Mark Farner and recruited Mel Schacher, the bassist for the hit band ? and the Mysterians, and formed Grand Funk Railroad. They hired Terry Knight as their manager. In 1973, Grand Funk released the album "We're An American Band," featuring the hit song "We're An American Band". This track, written and sung by Brewer, was the band's first #1 single. Still popular, the song has since been recorded by other artists. In addition to playing drums for Grand Funk, Brewer also provided lead vocals for a number of songs. This is evidenced by the first and third verses of the song "Some Kind Of Wonderful". Brewer was the baritone lead singer for the group, in contrast to the tenor vocals of Mark Farner.

In 1977, following the initial breakup of Grand Funk, Brewer and former Grand Funk bandmates Mel Schacher and Craig Frost formed a new band named "Flint". Flint released one self-titled album before disbanding. In 1981, Brewer and Farner resurrected Grand Funk for an album that cracked the Billboard albums chart. Two years later, they split again and Brewer joined Bob Seger's Silver Bullet Band. He also continued in other musical endeavors, including producing for the band The Godz. In 1996 Brewer, Schacher, and Farner reunited as Grand Funk, and were eventually named one of Pollstar's top-grossing acts of 1998. Farner decided to leave the band at the end of 1998 to resume his solo career. In 2000, Brewer and Schacher added vocalist Max Carl, former KISS guitarist Bruce Kulick and keyboardist Tim Cashion to the line-up.