Ric Ocasek is an American songwriter, musician and record producer. He is best
known as the vocalist, rhythm guitarist and songwriter for the rock band, the
Cars. Ocasek has been married to model Paulina Porizkova since 1989.
Early life Ocasek grew up in Baltimore, Maryland.
When Ocasek was 16 years old, his family moved to Cleveland, Ohio. After
graduating from Maple Heights High School, Ocasek briefly attended Bowling
Green State University and Antioch College. However, he dropped out to
pursue a career in music. Ocasek met future Cars bassist Benjamin
Orr in Cleveland in the 1960s after Ocasek saw Orr performing with his band
the Grasshoppers on the Big 5 Show, a local musical variety program. He
reconnected with Orr a few years later in Columbus, Ohio, and the two began
booking bands together. Soon, they formed one of their own and began to
perform in and around Ohio State University.
Early career Ocasek and Orr were in various bands in
Columbus and Ann Arbor, Michigan before re-locating to Boston in the early
1970s. In Boston, they formed a Crosby, Stills and Nash-style folk rock band
called Milkwood. They released one album, How's the Weather, on Paramount
Records in early 1973 but it failed to chart. After Milkwood, Ocasek formed the
group Richard and the Rabbits, which included Orr and keyboardist Greg
Hawkes, who had played on Milkwood's album. Ocasek and Orr also performed as
an acoustic duo during this period. Some of the songs they played became the
early Cars songs. Later, Ocasek and Orr teamed up with guitarist Elliot Easton
in the band Cap'n Swing. Cap'n Swing soon came to the attention of WBCN disc
jockey Maxanne Sartori, who began playing songs from their demo tape on
her show. After Cap'n Swing was rejected by several record labels, Ocasek got rid
of the bass player and drummer and decided to form a band that better fit
his style of writing. Orr took over on bass and David Robinson, best known for
his career with the Modern Lovers, became the drummer. Hawkes returned to
play keyboards and the band became "The Cars" in late 1976.
The Cars Ocasek's breakout success was as a
founding member of the Cars, which had numerous hit songs from 1978 to 1988; he
played rhythm guitar and sang lead vocals for a majority of songs. After
splitting writing duty with Orr in the 1970s, Ocasek became the principal
songwriter of the band, and wrote nearly all of the Cars' material, sharing
credit on only a few songs with bandmate Greg Hawkes as co-writer. In 2010,
Ocasek reunited with the surviving original members of the Cars to record
their first album in 24 years, titled Move Like This, which was released on
May 10, 2011. Solo career
The singer released his first solo album in 1982. Beatitude is a somewhat more
experimental variation of the Cars' new wave rock sound. On some tracks Ocasek
played all of the instruments. Greg Hawkes played on the album. A more
synthesizer-heavy follow up, This Side of Paradise, was released in 1986. This
featured Hawkes, Elliot Easton and Ben Orr. A No. 15 hit single, "Emotion in
Motion", accompanied the album. The Cars disbanded in 1988, and he
disappeared from the public eye for a couple of years. He resurfaced in 1990
with his own album, Fireball Zone. One track, "Rockaway", enjoyed a brief stay
on the charts, but his solo albums have seen disappointing sales, especially
compared to his success with the Cars. He subsequently released other solo
works throughout the decade, including 1993's Quick Change World, 1996's
Getchertikitz, and 1997's Billy Corgan-produced Troublizing. In 2005
Ocasek released another album, Nexterday, to little fanfare, but it
received positive reviews. Production
During his time with the Cars, Ocasek developed a reputation as a successful
producer, and took this role for many up-and-coming bands of differing genres
including Bad Brains' Rock for Light and Guided by Voices' Do the Collapse. His
other production credits include Weezer's Blue Album & Green Album,
Suicide, Romeo Void, Hole, Bebe Buell, No Doubt, Nada Surf, Irish folk-punk
band Black 47, Bad Religion, Johnny Bravo, D Generation, The Wannadies,
Possum Dixon, Martin Rev, Jonathan Richman, and the 2006 album by The Pink
Spiders titled Teenage Graffiti. He also produced a portion of the third Motion
City Soundtrack album, Even If It Kills Me. In 2014, Ocasek produced Everything
Will Be Alright in the End, the ninth studio album by Weezer and his third
collaboration with the band, and For All My Sisters, the sixth album by The
Cribs. In other media
Ocasek wrote a book of poetry, 1993's Negative Theatre. It was at one time
expected to be incorporated into an album and multimedia incarnation of the
same name, but those plans were dropped abruptly. For many years Ocasek had a
hobby of making drawings, photo collages, and mixed-media art works
which, in 2009, were shown at a gallery in Columbus, Ohio as an exhibit called
"Teahead Scraps". Ocasek had a cameo role as a beatnik
painter in the John Waters film Hairspray, and had a small part in the
1987 movie Made in Heaven in which he played a mechanic.
Ocasek stated in a 2005 interview in Rockline that he hated touring and it
was unlikely that he would do so again. He also stated he would not be reuniting
with the Cars again, but gave the okay to his former bandmates to do so with
Todd Rundgren replacing him on vocals as the New Cars.
On April 17, 2006, Ocasek appeared on The Colbert Report and volunteered to
put Todd Rundgren "on notice". He appeared again on the July 26, 2006,
episode to cheers from the audience as he volunteered to lead a commando
mission to "rescue" Stephen Jr., the baby eagle at the San Francisco Zoo
named after Stephen Colbert. He also appeared again on April 18, 2007, in
order to support his wife during her appearance on the show, after remarks
that she found Colbert "extremely attractive". He has been mentioned many
times in other episodes as well. The Cars, with Ocasek, appeared on The
Colbert Report on August 9, 2011, to promote their new album, Move Like This.
In 2012, Ocasek wrote another book, "Lyrics and Prose", a complete
collection of lyrics from his solo albums, as well from the Cars' albums.
It also contains prose and poetry never set to music, also photographs and
artwork done over the years that was previously unpublished.
Personal life Ocasek has been married three times. He
married early in life, but divorced and was married to his second wife, Suzanne
Ocasek, in 1972. Ocasek was still married to Suzanne when he met model
Pavlína Pořízková during filming of the music video for the Cars' song "Drive"
in 1984. Ocasek and Porizkova were married in 1989.
Ocasek has six sons, two from each of his three marriages. His eldest son,
Christopher Otcasek, was a singer who formed the rock group Glamour Camp which
released one album 1989. Adam Otcasek was born in 1970. Eron was born in 1973
and Derek was born in 1982. He and co-founder of the Cars Benjamin
Orr were known to be close friends. Their friendship was commemorated in the
song "Silver" which Ocasek wrote as a dedication to Orr upon his death in
2000. Discography
= Solo albums= Beatitude
This Side of Paradise Fireball Zone
Quick Change World Negative Theater
Troublizing Nexterday
Spoken word album Getchertikitz, a collaboration with Alan
Vega = Singles=
= Other appearances= References
External links Official website
Ric Ocasek VH1 artist page Ric Ocasek AOL artist page
Ric Ocasek Billboard artist page Ric Ocasek Allmusic artist page
Ric Ocasek at the Internet Movie Database