Cars Co-Founder Ric Ocasek Dead
• UPDATED: Making a tragic rock weekend even worse, on the heels of Friday’s death of Eddie Money came the equally sad news on Sunday afternoon that Ric Ocasek, the co-founder and lead singer of the seminal new wave band The Cars, had been found dead in his Manhattan apartment. As to the burning question of Ocasek’s age, NPR reports, “There is some confusion about Ocasek’s age: The NYPD said that he was 75; public records list his age as 70 years old.”
Law enforcement sources told The New York Post‘s Page Six that Ocasek was discovered unconscious and unresponsive at around 4:14pm ET Sunday inside his Gramercy Park home by his estranged wife, former model Paulina Porizkova. He appeared to have died from natural causes. Ocasek and Porizkova — who met in 1984 while shooting the music video for “Drive,” had been together for 28 years until they separated in May 2018. The couple shared two children.
According to The New York Times, “The Cars grew out of a friendship forged in the late ’60s in Ohio between Ocasek — born Richard Theodore Otcasek — and Benjamin Orr, who died of pancreatic cancer in 2000. They worked together in multiple bands before moving to Boston and forming the Cars in the late ’70s with Elliot Easton on guitar, Greg Hawkes on keyboards and David Robinson on drums. It was the beginning of the punk era, but the Cars, signed to Elektra Records made their first albums with Queen’s producer, Roy Thomas Baker, creating songs that were terse and moody but impeccably polished.”
The Cars shot to fame with their self-titled 1978 debut album, which was packed with hits like “My Best Friend’s Girl,” “Just What I Needed,” “Good Times Roll,” “Bye Bye Love” and “You’re All I’ve Got Tonight,” to name a few. From 1978 to 1987, the band put out six albums, and in 1984, they took home MTV’s coveted “Video of the Year” award for “You Might Think.” The Cars broke up in 1988, but Ocasek’s influence in the music industry extended well beyond the apex of the group’s career — in addition to releasing half a dozen solo albums, Ocasek also worked in A&R and produced work by New Wave-era peers like Suicide and Romeo Void as well as projects by Weezer, No Doubt, Guided by Voices and Bad Religion. After a lengthy hiatus, The Cars reunited in 2011 and released an album called Move Like This. It was their first, and only, album without the late Ben Orr. The Cars were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year.
• Benztown has produced an audio tribute to Ocasek, written, produced and voiced by Adam Keckskemeti.
