Target

Cleveland, 1970-74

Target is best known historically for the band Wally Bryson and Mike McBride joined after the great Cyrus Erie / Quick shakeout of 1969. There was a predecessor band, POE, that included Wally and Stu Leyda on drums, with Mike Chandler and Vic (last name unconfirmed). Mike McBride from CE joined as lead singer (in CE, McBride had sung Rolling Stones songs while Eric Carmen played drums) and the band, according to accounts back in the day, did about 80% Stones songs. Eric Robertson had been the lead singer and guitarist in POE, it's believed he left when Wally and Mike joined.

A few months into Target's history, Wally heard of a new band Eric was starting and decided to rejoin him - this new band becoming the Raspberries. At this point Target's history is not completely clear to us. The band is somewhat infamous among Cleveland musicians for having well over 20 members during it's existence. John Aleksic played in the band for a bit after leaving the Raspberries.

Sometime in 1973, one of the Raspberry schisms happened and Wally returned to Target. He was not with them long, and here's where we have some more direct history on the band., courtesy of Wally's replacement, Jeff Castile (formerly of Euphrates and Grenade) "When Bryson went back to play with the Raspberries, that's when I got the call from McBride. So, I replaced Wally Bryson in Target. Interestingly, Wally Bryson and Mike McBride shared a house in Willoughby and Target rehearsed in the basement of that house. So Wally would drop in to our rehersal from time to time. The last time I saw Mike McBride and Wally Bryson was at the Utopia which was basically right across the street from the Bryson/McBride house - they were rehearsing there and working out the material for the last Raspberries album." At this time Target included Jeff, Mike, Bob Coulson (bass),  Craig Allen Nichols (drums), and Jeff Hutton (keyboards).  Hutton and Coulson had been in Lizard, while Nichols had been in Child's Smile.