Three years later he formed the Destroyers in Delaware before moving them to Boston where they backed visiting blues stars. Thorogood played as an opener for Hound Dog Taylor and the Houserockers early in his career and was greatly influenced by them. Other musicians worth mentioning are John Lee Hooker (Thorogood has said that he is the best man to play with Hooker because they both play as "wrong"), Elmore James, Chuck Berry, Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.

The Delaware Destroyers was comprised of Thorogood (guitar), Michael Levine (bass), and Jeff Simon (drums). School friend Ron Smith played guitar on and off to make up the quartet. There was briefly another bass player, Bill Judefind. According to some sources the Destroyers played quite often like the Houserockers, without a bass player. In 1974 they recorded some demos in Boston which were later released in 1979 as an MCA rip-off-album called Better Than The Rest.

No record company was really interested in them, so they kept on playing the blues in small clubs. It was not until hot July night in 1975 when diehard blues fanatic John Forward was looking for some live blues in the Boston area. He decided to go to Joe's Place in Cambridge although he had never heard of George Thorogood and Delaware Destroyers, who often played there. He was thrilled with their music and named himself as Fan Number 1. He put them in touch with an independent folk label called Rounder.

They made their first album in 1975 but the album was not released until 1977 for many reasons. Some say that Thorogood was too "rocking" for the folk label. But Rounder claims that they had no suitable photos for the album. During recording sessions bass player Levine either resigned or was fired. He was replaced by Bill Blough.

After some good publicity about their first album, Thorogood & the Destroyers released their second album in 1978. This album gave Thorogood & Destroyers world wide recognition. The title track, a cover of Hank Williams' classic, was pulled as a single and received heavy FM airplay. The album made it to Top 40 and eventually went gold.

Smith left in 1980 and was replaced by saxophonist Hank Carter. Carter, who lived in the same city as Thorogood, was considered as the toughest player in town (even tougher than Thorogood) and nobody had the guts to ask him to join The Destroyers until 1980. Carter accepted their offer immediately and is still playing with them after 17 years.

Thorogood, a former semi-professional baseball player, took time away from music that season to play ball. But by 1981 was back in the fold as the band opened for the Rolling Stones at several their American gigs. The venues were unfamiliar to Thorogood as normally he shunned large areas for smaller clubs, even going to extent of playing under false names to prevent the smaller venues being overcrowded.

George Thorogood & Destroyers' famous tour in 1981 was called 50/50.That meant they toured 50 states in 50 days and played a gig in every one of them. No nights off!

After their third album in 1980 with Rounder they signed to EMI. Their final breakthrough album was in 1982 released Bad To The Bone. The song called "Bad To The Bone" was in the movie Christine. They made their first music video from that same song featuring Thorogood and Bo Diddley. The title track of the album became their first major crossover hit, thanks to MTV's saturation airplay of the song's video. The album went gold and spent nearly a full year on the charts.

In 1985, The Destroyers released their best selling album, Maverick. A song from that album, "I Drink Alone", was used for the Don't Drink and Drive-campaign. In the same year they appeared at Live Aid playing with blues legends Albert Collins and Bo Diddley.

In 1986, EMI noticed how popular George Thorogood And The Destroyers really were and released a live album called simply, Live. They have continued releasing albums after that, every two years. Their newest album, Rockin' My Life Away, was released in spring of '97.

Nobody seems to know anything about George Thorogood's personal life. He doesn't want to talk about it, claiming that he is a ageless man who enjoys rough life and endless touring. He is interested only in music, beer, women and baseball. He understands someone writing about John Lee Hooker or James Brown - people who've made an incredible impact on music history. But the Destroyers? "We're like a burger joint," he says. "Then again, there's nothing wrong with selling cheeseburgers as long as they're quality cheeseburgers," he adds and says that's the way he thinks of the Destroyers.

2nd BIO:
George Thorogood, guitars and vocals Bill Blough, bassbHank Carter, sax, keyboards, guitars and vocals Jeff Simon, drums and percussion

The notion of taking rock and roll for granted has never crossed George Thorogood's mind. Twenty five years after he and his redoubtable Destroyers began hammering audiences with their distinctive brand of blues inspired rock, George remains as passionately committed as ever to the music that has served as his life's personal soundtrack. It's tempting to say that George has "seen it all" in his career, but that implies a cynicism that hardly fits the artist today. After twelve albums, fifteen million records sold, twelve hundred plus concerts and countless late nights listening to idols like John Lee Hooker, Howlin' Wolf and The Rolling Stones, George still approaches his craft with the same sense of awe and wonder as a child on Christmas morning.

George recently recalled that he began playing live on street corners because he enjoyed it so much. Dismissing the impulse to turn his music into a strictly commercial venture, George has fought against the "corporate" big- bucks mentality that has robbed rock of its sense of fun and innocence, and as a result he has been called a maverick within the record industry for quite some time. The notion of being a rebel with a cause so struck him, he named his second EMI album, "Maverick." The title has stuck, but he makes no apologies. "When I grew up listening to people like Chuck Berry and Little Richard, they were singing songs about having fun. It felt natural. I think people get much too serious about rock. I don't. If that makes me different, so be it."

For his "lucky' thirteenth album and first for CMC international Records, Thorogood has retained the gritty authenticity that has become his signature, borrowing both from experience and embracing new challenges. With trusted old friend Terry Manning once again riding production shotgun, George and the Destroyers have let it all hang out, producing a work that forges their time tested alliance of arresting original material and eye opening covers tunes.

"I Don't Trust Nobody," the first single release (written by Willie Dixon bandmate Eddie Shaw), underscores one critic's observation that "Thorogood has the uncanny knack of finding classic chestnuts from the masters of blues and rock and interpreting them in his own unique way." The same can be said of his interpretations of Fats Domino's "Nothing New," Chuck Berry's "Hellbound train" and the Swingin' Medallions classic "Double Shot." George's songs, "Not Tonight (I Have a Heartache)" and "Just Passin' Thru," bristle with emotional intensity and reveal why he's as vibrant and relevant today as he was when he began his recording career at Rounder Records in the late 70's.

Because George's philosophy is to provide his legions of fans with the music they have come to crave for as long as they're enjoying themselves, he's ebulliently optimistic about his immediate and long-term future. The new record will serve as the departure point for a series of exciting new opportunities.

Beginning with his three shows at Los Angeles' vaunted House of Blues and Las Vegas' hard rock venue, The Joint, George has dedicated 1999 and beyond to a furious all out rock and roll assault by the Destroyers on the air waves and concert stages of America. He's rededicated himself to the proposition that rock has the ability to inspire and uplift like no other medium and he's determined to prove it all over again. He's always been cutting edge, both a forerunner and veteran. That's why everyone from The Rolling Stones and Little Feat to the Allman Brothers and ZZ Top have sought him out for tours. To quote his favorite comedian, Jackie Gleason, "How sweet it is."