Born in Akron, Ohio, he grew up in its nearby suburb of Stow and graduated from Stow High School.
He met his wife Kristy Wallace, better known as Poison Ivy, a.k.a. Ivy Rorschach, in Sacramento in 1972, when he and a friend picked her up when she was hitchhiking. The couple founded the band after they moved from California to Ohio in 1973, and then to New York in 1975, where they soon became part of the flourishing punk scene.
Lux Interior's name came "from an old car commercial", after he previously flirted with the names Vip Vop and Raven Beauty, while his wife's name change was inspired by "a vision she received in a dream". The couple called their musical style psychobilly, a word that appears in the lyrics of Johnny Cash's song, "One Piece at a Time", and gothabilly. The band later said that they were just using the phrases as "carny terms to drum up business."

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