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Old 01-12-2018, 08:22 PM
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COTM - #416 - Ray Thomas (Moody Blues)

Greeting Prog Fans

This week we celebrate the life and music of Ray Thomas, multi-instrumentalist, vocalist and composer for The Moody Blues. In fact he was one of the founding members along with Michael Pinder and Graeme Edge. Their first release was with Denny Laine at guitarist and lead vocalist and Clint Warwick on bass. The album was The Magnificent Moodies and it was released in 1965.

Denny Laine & Clint Warwick departed after the album so Ray brought in bassist John Lodge, with whom he had played with previously in the band El Rio and the Rebels in the early 60's. Justin Hayward was also recruited to replace Laine on guitar. With this line-up they performed mostly R&B covers and novelty tunes. Pretty soon they started to focus on their own works which would create that new and amazing orchestral sound that helped lay the foundations of Progressive Rock.

Along the way of The Moody Blues' history, Ray Thomas also released a pair of solo albums. From Mighty Oaks in 1975 and Hopes, Wishes and Dreams in 1976.

Ray retired at the end of 2002 due to declining health. He would later courageously step forward to help Prostate Cancer Awareness by re-releasing his two solo albums in a box-set in 2010. Ray Thomas passed on January 4, 2018 as a result of Prostate Cancer.

Today I will be playing tracks from just about all of The Moody Blues albums that Ray is credited for composition. I also will have some select songs from Ray's two solo albums.

As a Post Script to this show I have added a few David Bowie tracks to acknowledge the 2nd anniversary of his Jan. 10, 2016 passing.

I hope you'll enjoy listening in this week.
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