Ric Ocasek, One of Music's Most Unique Voices with The Cars, Has Died

by Julian Spivey
Ric Ocasek, the frontman and songwriter for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame group The Cars, was found dead in his Manhattan apartment on Sunday, September 15. The majority of publications had his death at 75, though some have disputed he was younger. A cause of death has not yet been announced.
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Ocasek’s unique voice and his introverted, almost nonchalant performance style, along with his often mysterious, abstract lyrics made him one of the most interesting frontmen of any group in the late ‘70s and ‘80s.

Ocasek formed The Cars with bassist and occasional vocalist Benjamin Orr in the mid-‘70s in Boston after previously playing in other bands in the area with Orr since the late ‘60s. The group’s self-titled debut album debuted in 1978 and provided charting hits in “Just What I Needed” (with vocals from Orr), “My Best Friend’s Girl” and “Good Times Roll,” which helped to usher in the new subgenre of rock and pop known as New Wave. This new sound proved to be a success with fans of not only rock and pop, but also punk, giving The Cars a wide array of fan.

In a 1978 profile for the New York Times critic Robert Palmer would summarize why the group’s sound appealed to so many by saying: “They have taken some important but disparate contemporary trends – punk minimalism, the labyrinthine synthesizer and guitar textures of art rock, the ‘50s rockabilly revival and the melodious terseness of power pop – and mixed them into a personal and appealing blend.”

The band would be named Best New Artist in a 1978 Rolling Stone magazine readers’ poll.

The Cars would receive a lot of airplay on the new televised medium of MTV throughout the ‘80s, with their music video for “You Might Think” winning the very first Video of the Year award at the inaugural MTV Video Music Awards in 1984 where it now infamously beat out Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”

The band would have a major pop culture moment in 1982 when the synth-y instrumental for “Moving in Stereo,” off their debut, would be prominently placed in director Amy Heckerling’s coming-of-age comedy “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” in one of cinema’s sexiest scenes where then Hollywood “it girl” Phoebe Cates coming out of a swimming pool in slow motion in a fantasy sequence. That scene and the song’s involvement would be paid homage in a recent season three episode of Netflix’s “Stranger Things” in which Dacre Montgomery’s character Billy enters a pool.
The Cars would have seven top-20 Billboard hits throughout the ‘80s, with their most successful track “Drive,” an unusually soft ballad for the group with vocals by Orr, charting at No. 3 in 1984.
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The group would break up in 1988 but had made their mark on the music world known in the decade prior. Ocasek would go on to release five solo albums after the group’s demise. He had released two during the band’s run.

In 2000, Orr died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 53 meaning a complete reunion for the band would never take place. However, in 2011 Ocasek and the rest of the group would reunite for the album Move Like This, which would be the seventh and final studio album for The Cars.

For years The Cars were absent from the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in consistently curious voting decisions, especially given how popular the band was and how important of a group they were mixing many different sounds of music to help bring a completely new subgenre in New Wave to the forefront. The band was finally inducted in 2018 with the living members of the group reuniting once again for the induction, as well as a performance of some of their greatest hits for the ceremony. This would be the last time Ocasek would perform with the group.

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