Audio By Carbonatix
In this edition of This Week In Dallas Music History, former Dallas Observer music editor Sarah Hepola offers one of the earliest stories we ever published on the late Spector 45 frontman Frankie Campagna.
In 2004, when the story was written, the then-17-year-old Campagna was already a familiar face around Deep Ellum. Spector 45 had been around for a few years at that point, and, before that, Frankie could be seen kicking around the neighborhood with his father Frank Campagna, who painted murals on the brick walls of buildings throughout Deep Ellum.
As the story goes, on the day before Christmas Eve in 2003, Frankie had a flat tire on Garland Road. He started to change the tire on his 1973 International Harvest, when the jack buckled under the truck’s weight and popped him in the face. Even worse, the bare steel rim of the tire came down on Frankie’s hand, resulting in a hospital stay for Christmas Eve.
Although the event sidelined him from Spector 45 for a while, Frankie was determined to get back to his guitar as quickly as possible. After the jump, a touching quote from a young performer intent on playing music for the foreseeable future.
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“I have some scars on my face. My middle finger’s shredded. There’s some nerve damage. But I’ll be able to play again eventually. Maybe rhythm guitar, but I’m gonna keep playing.”
Check out the entire article in our Observer archives.
