WARREN — Left End lead guitar player Tom Figinsky compared Saturday’s concert at Packard Music Hall to a family reunion.

It’s a mighty big family.

About 1,400 people attended the show, the first performance by the four surviving original members in nearly a decade. That’s a bigger crowd than the ones drawn by some of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees who played Packard last year..

Then again, if there were a Mahoning Valley Music Hall of Fame, Left End would be one of the first acts chosen.

The band was signed to Polydor Records, which released Left End’s “Spoiled Rotten” album in 1974, and it toured the country, playing shows with acts ranging from the J. Geils Band to Parliament. However, the band’s local following was built with shows nearly every night of the week in the rock clubs and bars that thrived in the Valley in the 1970s, and its annual gigs seen by thousands at Idora Park.

On Saturday, original members Figinsky, lead guitar and backing vocals; Patsy Palombo, drums; Jim Puhalla, rhythm guitar; and Roy Guerrieri, bass and backing vocals; were joined by guitarist / vocalist David Lemasters, who joined the band in 1987, and backup singer Leanne Binder.

Taking the place of original lead singer Dennis Sesonsky, known on stage as Dennis T. Menass, was Michael Lawrence of Las Vegas. Sesonsky died in 2014.

Over two sets, the band served up favorites like “Sunshine Girl,” “Loser,” “Ridin’ Again,” “High-Heeled Angel” and “Bad Talkin’ Lady” along with a couple of covers — Golden Earring’s “Radar Love” and a medley of Led Zeppelin songs as “Left Zeppelin” — before ending the night with “Cyclone Rider.”

Before playing “Bad Talkin’ Lady,” Lemasters talked about living 500 yards from the music hall on Packard Street NW when he joined Left End, and how the band used to rehearse there.

Lemasters said on Sunday the band was happy with the turnout and the performance.

“It was really great,” he said. “Everyone played so well, it was like we turned back the clock.”

The crowd was filled with longtime fans.

Eric Newton and Gary Yancsurak, both of Austintown, were wearing Left End T-shirts they got at the band’s last concert in 2014.

Yancsurak guessed he first saw Left End at the Orange Room in Austintown in the early ’70s, while Newton’s first show was at Idora Park in 1979 when he was 13 years old.

“Then I followed them through the ’80s once I was old enough to get into the bars,” he said. “I’ve probably seen them 30 times, and I wish I’d seen them more times than that. This band went through the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s with fans and they packed any bar they played.”

Paul Knapik of Boardman was wearing a Left End T-shirt from the late ’70s that he said he probably got at a show at the Orange Room.

“I used to go there every Sunday night,” Knapik said. “I used to go the Agora too. I was there when they recorded the live album (“Live Living and Breathing”). I got hooked on them when I was young. I always liked rock music and it just resonated with me.”

Chris Guerrieri, the son of Left End’s bass player, had a child-size version of the late ’70s T-shirt when he was growing up. Since it no longer fits, he had copies made that family members wore to Saturday’s show. He had Sesonky’s name added to the red tennis shoe on the back in memory of the late lead singer.

“He would tell me stories about Dennis and I’d go, ‘Yeah, you’re embellishing. No way he was that crazy,'” Guerrieri said. “Then I saw him live. He was wild.”

Photos of Sesonsky appeared several times on the screen behind the band as it played. Lawrence said he had a white tuxedo jacket with tails made for the concert to mimic one Sesonsky frequently wore on stage.

“I’m absolutely honored to be on stage with the legendary Left End,” Lawrence said early in the concert. “And I’m humbled to be singing the songs of the great Dennis T. Menass.”

Lemasters offered some hope that fans might not have to wait so long for the next Left End gig.

“There was a buzz last night,” Lemasters said. “I’m thinking there’s a possibility, if people are interested, we may try something again, maybe in the Youngstown area. We can’t wait 20 years between shows anymore. If we’re going to play again, it’s going to have to be in the next year or so.”

agray@tribtoday.com