Throughout the 1970s, Ierace was credited by various names on Jaggerz and Wild Cherry albums: by his birth name, Dominic Ierace; Don Ierace; and a stage name he had adopted to make it easier for people to remember his name, Don Iris. By the end of the decade, as far as his music/public life went, he went by the name of Donnie Iris.
It was during this period that he became acquainted with Mark Avsec, then playing keyboards for Wild Cherry. Wild Cherry was unable to duplicate the success of "Play That Funky Music" and disbanded by the end of the decade. Becoming good friends, Donnie and Mark decided to form a project together after Wild Cherry's breakup and the two began writing songs. Their first release saw the disco-influenced single "Bring on the Eighties" backed by a cover of "Because of You" in 1979; however it failed to garner attention. Iris and Avsec decided to go in a harder direction for their next release and returned to the studio with guitarist Marty Lee Hoenes, bassist Albritton McClain and drummer Kevin Valentine, who at the time was in the band Breathless with Avsec, to record his first full-length album. This line-up would form to what would become known as Donnie Iris and the Cruisers.
Iris' first album, Back on the Streets, was released in July 1980 on the small Cleveland, Ohio-based Midwest Records. With the track "Ah! Leah!" receiving airplay in Boston, Cleveland and Pittsburgh, MCA Records took notice and quickly signed Iris to a five-album deal and re-released the album nationally in October with MCA reversing side order to make "Ah! Leah!" appear as 1st track on side 1 of the album.
Artist: Donnie Iris
Album: Back On The Streets
Year: 1980
Label: MCA / Carousel (Gloversville Pressing)
Style: Classic Rock, Melodic Rock
Format: mp3/320, flac (track, 48kHz/24bit)
Tracklist
01 Ah! Leah! 3:45
02 I Can't Hear You 3:39
03 Joking 4:05
04 Shock Treatment 3:49
05 Back On The Streets 3:33
06 Agnes 3:30
07 You're Only Dreaming 4:46
08 She's So Wild 2:35
09 Daddy Don't Live Here Anymore 3:49
10 Too Young To Love 5:30
Donnie Iris – Back On The Streets (1980) (US press, Vinyl-rip) mp3+flac
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