Whatever happened to …

… Dr Hook?

It was with the recent passing of Ray Sawyer that I realized that I hadn’t heard any Dr Hook music for a long, long time. Since then, I’ve been on a bit of a tear streaming and downloading their music.

If you go back to the 1970s in your music enjoyment (and you really should; it was the best of times), Ray was unique in the band and music in general. He always wore a cowboy hat with a feather in it and he wore an eye patch.

It’s kind of sad but I only remember Ray Sawyer and Dennis Locorriere although there were other members. Their genre, I guess, would be Southern Rock. It appealed to me for the lyrics and the fact that they had the sounds of a steel guitar in the band. That was my instrument!

If you were to look at them, you might make the assumption that they were pretty wild and I guess they were when performing live. Their recorded music isn’t like that. I learned from a local discussion group that they actually played in Amherstburg downtown at one point.

I went looking for them on the radio. Surely, the 70s on 7 channel on Sirius XM would play them. I left the channel on for a couple of long weeks and finally, on one Sunday morning while listening to repeats of Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 show, they played a Dr Hook song. I pulled over to the side of the road immediately and set an alert for Dr Hook so that I can catch it on any channel good enough to play it.

If you haven’t listened to them or listened to them lately, here’s a sampling.

More Like The Movies – a song for every man who failed with a girlfriend for not making things as romantic as the movies.

If Not You – I remember a spot where Locorierre had never intended this to go anywhere because of stereotypes and it turned out to be a great hit for them.

Cover Of The Rolling Stone – if you only know one Dr Hook song, this is probably it.

Sylvia’s Mother – in my mind, their greatest song describing reaching out to Sylvia and getting her mother instead! Kids today won’t understand the “and the operator says $0.40 more for the next three minutes”.

R.I.P. Ray Sawyer

While the band hasn’t been together for years, Dennis Locorriere is on tour right now.

So, here are a few questions to bring out the Dr Hook in you.

• Why did Sawyer wear an eyepatch?
• Is this the first time that you’ve heard of this group?
• Dr Hook wasn’t their original name. What was it?
• What popular children’s book author wrote songs for Dr Hook?
• Why isn’t there a period after Dr?
• Have you ever played a steel guitar?
• Is there a way to set a watch for an artist on Sirius XM Radio without waiting until they play one of their songs?
• Given all the success they had, and they had a lot, why aren’t they played more on the oldies station?
• Did they ever make the cover of the Rolling Stone?

I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

This is a regular Sunday morning post around here. You can check them all out here.