• July 4, 1950
• He was born Steve Krikorian in Palm Desert, California.
• Before becoming a solo artist in the L.A. music scene, Krikorian was in the post-Buddy Holly Crickets.
• His three albums were released on three different labels.
• He went on to co-write "Love Is," recorded by Vanessa Williams and Brian McKnight. It went to #1.
• When Tonio K was at high school, he had ambitions of becoming an architect. However he decided he wasn't mathematical enough to pursue it as a career option. Tonio told us: "I gave up on architecture when I had to give up on math or start studying. I got through algebra okay without doing any homework or a little homework, but by the time I got to trig, it was, you can't do this s--t if you're not going to go home and do homework. You really have to study this."
• Tonio considers "We Walk On" to be his best ever song. "Certainly not the most commercial," he told us, "but if I had to pick one song, that's the best song I've ever written, 'We Walk On.'" And if I was to put out one old school 45 with a big hole in the middle, I would have 'We Walk On' on one side and 'The Executioner's Song' on the other side."

Comments: 1

• The Cat's Still In The Freezer from ArizonaTonio K turned my life upside down when I first heard Life In The Food Chain. it was a dark time for me. Tonio taught me that I had to "laugh at the fact that there ain't nothin funny". That was 40odd years ago. I wrote a fangirl letter. His publicist sent pithy press releases, and someone, I'd like to think Tonio himself, scrawled in the margins " is the cat still in the freezer?" Never understood that, but from that day on, I've kept a ceramic cat right where it belongs. I started feeling my anger ( H.A.T.R.E.D.), dancing out my feelings, and never again sat in a bathtub at 3am watching my blood swirl prettily into the water. AMERIKA might be my all time favorite album. I needed those songs for fuel to get down the road.

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