Artist: The Cars
LP: 7" single
Song: "Since You're Gone"
While listening to fits and starts of NPR's "Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me" this past Sunday as I zoomed around Wallingford delivering Amazon parcels, I caught a brief snippet of the news that The Cars' frontman Ric Ocasek had died. I wasn't as much a fan of his solo work after the group split up, but The Cars' "Shake It Up" and "Since You're Gone" (which peaked at #41 on the Billboard singles charts in May of 1982) were favorites on the radio when I first began listening to popular music as a young teen. The Week magazine put together an obituary for Ric that I'd like to reproduce here, for two reasons: 1.) It's nice. 2.) Since I haven't worked a desk job since the end of May, I'm wondering if I can still type as fast as I used to. (Nope.)
Ric Ocasek Obituary from The Week of September 27, 2019; volume 19 issue 943:
The Cars frontman who drove rock's new wave
With his lanky 6-foot-4 frame, drawn-out features, and wobbly deadpan voice, Ric Ocasek was an unlikely rock star. But for a decade, the Cars frontman was one of the most successful musicians on the planet. Ocasek and his band-mates hit on a winning formula that married the arty angularity and jaded lyrics of punk and new wave with pure pop hooks. The Boston band's eponymous 1978 debut album sold 6 million copies in the U.S. and contained three hit singles—"Just What I Needed," "My Best Friend's Girl" and "Good Times Roll"—that became FM radio staples. In the 1980s, the Cars embraced the music video, making Ocasek and his ever-present sunglasses a familiar sight on MTV. He delighted in being a musical omnivore who straddled the alt-rock and pop worlds. "I was a huge fan of Dylan," he said, "but I always went for the left side of the music brain too. I loved the Velvet Underground and the Carpenters."
Born in Baltimore, Ocasek moved with his family to Cleveland—where his father worked as a NASA systems analyst—at age 16, and became something "of a teen misfit," said RollingStone.com. He spent hours in the family's basement, tinkering with guitar amplifiers and learning piano chords. He dropped out of college, and in 1965 met bassist Banjamin Orr. The pair performed together in various bands before forming the Cars in the Boston area in 1976. Local radio played the band's demo tape "so often that Elektra Records signed the group in 1978," said The Washington Post. Working with Queen producer Roy Thgomas Baker, the group cranked out their debut in 21 days. It remained on the album chart for 139 weeks.
"Ocasek's pop abilities reached a kind of pinnacle on 1984's Heartbeat City," said The Guardian (U.K.). He wrote the LP's smash single "Drive," which combines a gorgeously smooth melody with despairing lyrics. "Who's gonna pay attention to your dreams?" Orr sings, "And who's gonna plug their ears when you scream?" After the band split in 1988, Ocasek went on to release seven solo albums and produce albums by alt-rock acts such as Weezer, Bad Religion, and No Doubt. Music is "a way to get beyond loneliness," he said in 1980. "Just turn on a radio and there it is: a sense of belonging."
[ The Cars ]
[ March 23, 1944 — September 15, 2019 ]
We will miss you, Ric.
