Robbin Crosby, 42; Helped Found Heavy Metal Band Ratt
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Robbin Crosby, 42, a rock guitarist who was a founding member of the 1980s heavy metal band Ratt, died June 6 in Los Angeles of complications from AIDS.
Crosby announced that he had the disease in an interview last summer on Los Angeles radio station KNAC.com.
A native of San Diego, Crosby graduated from La Jolla High School and moved to Los Angeles in 1979.
He later teamed up with singer Stephen Pearcy and lead guitarist Warren De Martini to form Ratt.
They released a self-titled mini-album on a local label, then were signed by Atlantic Records.
The band’s breakthrough recording, “Out of the Cellar” in 1984, and “Invasion of Your Privacy,” released the next year, both went multi-platinum with sales of more than 2 million copies.
In the KNAC interview last year, Crosby said he suspected that he became infected with HIV while using heroin with the band in the late 1980s.
He said he had been in and out of hospitals for more than eight years.
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