From:   "Dik de Heer"  
Date:  Sat Feb 1, 2003  7:22 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Ray Sawyer
 
RAY SAWYER

Born 1 February 1937, Chickasaw, Alabama

Before finding fame and fortune as the eye-patched lead singer of Dr.
Hook and the Medicine Show in the seventies, Ray Sawyer made some
interesting rocking records for the Sandy label from Mobile, AL.
Sawyer was born on a pig farm on the outskirts of Chickasaw, a Mobile
suburb. Hank Williams became his idol when he was eleven years old.
As soon as he could, Ray got himself a guitar and started banging
country music out on it as best as he was able.
He got his first job as a professional musician at age 14 playing drums
with a local hillbilly band. His style was indelibly marked by blending the
black and white Southern music that kept Alabama dance halls and clubs
hopping. His interest then changed to his other love, rhythm and blues
music, as he ended up leading the house band at Al Cottrill's club in Mobile.
By the end of 1959 he signed with Sandy Records, a small label, established
in 1957 by Johnny Lee Bozeman and Paul Dubois. Hot on the R&B sounds
of New Orleans, he picked the old Spiders' recording of "Bells In My Heart"
for his first release. The flip, however, was the better side. "Rockin'
Satellite"
(Sandy 1030) was a cover of an earlier Sandy release from 1957, originally
cut by Mobile's premier R&B vocalist Tiny Watkins. Sawyer's version was
not a direct copy but a full throttle rocker with novel "beep beep" sound
effects. Sawyer's second and last release for Sandy (1037) was another
blues rocker, "I'm Gonna Leave". In fact, Sawyer did leave Sandy and turned
up next in New Jersey leading a new rock band, the Chocolate Papers in '65.
Ray's trademark eye patch was acquired following a 1967 auto accident that
left him without his right eye and kept him laid back for a year. In 1969 Ray
subsequently formed Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show, in time to record the
score to (and appear in) the Dustin Hoffman motion picture "Who is Harry
Kellerman and Why is He Saying These Terrible Things About Me?"
The group went on to accumulate 21 chart entries, 1972-82, but these
fall outside the scope of SAO. Ray is still active today.

More info: http://members.tripod.com/~ShelSilverstein/DrHook.html
"Rockin' Satellite" and "I'm Gonna Leave" can be found on the Various
Artists CD "Gulf Coast Grease : The Sandy Story, Vol. 1" (Ace 595).