Love is an American rock group that was most prominent in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They were originally led by singer/songwriter Arthur Lee, who wrote most of the songs, although some of their best known songs were written by Bryan MacLean. One of the first racially diverse American bands, their music drew on a diverse range of sources including folk rock, hard rock, blues, jazz, flamenco and orchestral pop. While finding only modest success on the music charts, Love would come to be praised by critics as one of the finest and most important American rock groups of their era.

After spending six years in prison from 1995 to 2001 for firearms offenses, Lee began touring in earnest under the name "Love with Arthur Lee". This new phase of his career met with great success, and he performed to enthusiastic audiences and critical acclaim throughout Europe, North America and Australia. This incarnation of Love was composed of the members of the aforementioned band Baby Lemonade, who had first performed with Lee in May 1993 in Hollywood at a club called Raji's. The band began performing the Forever Changes album in its entirety, often with a string and horn section. A live CD and DVD of this material was released in 2003.  Johnny Echols joined the new group for a special Forever Changes 35th Anniversary Tour performance at Royce Hall, UCLA, in the spring of 2003. Lee and the band continued to tour throughout 2003 and 2004, including many concerts in and around hometown Los Angeles, notably a show at the outdoor Sunset Junction festival, the San Diego Street Scene, and a headlining date with The Zombies at the Ebell Theatre. Echols joined Lee and the group on the continuing and final tours of 2004 to 2005. They played a well received date at the Fillmore in San Francisco with the full string and horn section.  Due to Arthur Lee's illness (acute myeloid leukemia), the details of which were not known by the band at the time, he could not participate in the final tour in July 2005. Since no one knew of his illness, Arthur's decision to forgo the final tour was met with angry, confused reactions. The remaining members of the band, along with Echols, continued to perform at the venues of the last tour (July 2005) without Lee, under the name The Love Band.  At the end of September 2005, Lee moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where he planned to continue to make music using the name Love. Joining him was to be drummer Greg Roberson (Reigning Sound, Her Majesty's Buzz, Compulsive Gamblers) to put together a new lineup in Memphis, which was to include Adam Woodard, Alex Greene (The Reigning Sound, Big Ass Truck), Jack "Oblivian" Yarber, Alicja Trout, and Johnny Echols from the original Love line-up. Ultimately Arthur's ill health prevented this from happening.  On January 5, 1998 Ken Forssi died at age 54 of a suspected brain tumor in his home state of Florida. Bryan MacLean died in Los Angeles of a heart attack at age 52 on December 25, 1998 while having dinner with a young fan who was researching a book about Love. In 2002 Michael Stuart (now known as Michael Stuart-Ware), the drummer on the Love albums Da Capo and Forever Changes, wrote the acclaimed book Behind the Scenes on the Pegasus Carousel with the Legendary Rock Group Love. Stuart-Ware and Johnny Echols performed with Baby Lemonade at Hollywood's Whisky A Go-Go on June 28, 2006 in a benefit concert for Arthur Lee. But Lee died of his disease, acute myeloid leukemia, on August 3, 2006 in his home town of Memphis, Tennessee, at age 61.

Ask a question about this article.
Did the band members get along?