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The J. Geils Band

American rock band

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 20, 2026
Entity authorityQ1542906
Source-derived summary

The J. Geils Band (formerly known as The J. Geils Blues Band) was an American rock band formed in 1967, in Worcester, Massachusetts, under the leadership of guitarist John "J." Geils. The original band members included vocalist Peter Wolf, harmonica, trumpet, and saxophone player Richard "Magic Dick" Salwitz (lead blues singer before Wolf joined the band), drummer Stephen Bladd, vocalist/keyboardist Seth Justman, and bassist Danny Klein. Wolf and Justman served as principal songwriters. The band played R&B-influenced blues rock during the 1970s, and achieved commercial success before moving toward a more mainstream new wave sound in the early 1980s, which brought the band to its commercial peak.

They performed a mix of cover songs of classic blues and R&B songs, along with original compositions written primarily by Wolf and Justman, as well as some group compositions written under the pseudonymous name Juke Joint Jimmy. After Wolf left the band in 1983 to pursue a solo career, the band released one more album in 1984 with Justman and Bladd on lead vocals, before breaking up in 1985. Beginning in 1999, the band had several reunions until the death of its namesake, J. Geils, on April 11, 2017.

The band first released several Top 40 singles in the early 1970s, including a cover of the song "Lookin' For A Love" by The Valentinos (which reached No. 39 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972), as well as the single "Give It to Me" (No. 30 in 1973).

Editorial summary

“The J. Geils Band” enters the record as american rock band. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Geils, Band and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1967, 1983, 1984, 1985—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1967-01-01. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Geils, Band and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“The J. Geils Band” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Geils, Band and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1542906. VIAF identifies the subject as 121011523. The Library of Congress control number is n82215278. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1967, 1983, 1984 and 1985.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  • Search vocabulary
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The J. Geils Band”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The J. Geils Band primary sources, The J. Geils Band archive and Geils research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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  2. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from The J. Geils Band” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.