Biography
Although primarily recognized for his synthesizer contributions to the Cars, Greg Hawkes also issued a solitary solo album and contributed to sessions by assorted fellow musicians. A native of Baltimore, MD, where he spent his formative years, Hawkes began studying piano early on yet soon set the instrument aside in pursuit of comic books and Japanese cult films. By age 14 he had taken up guitar and assembled his initial band, the Aardvarks. Returning to piano, he entered Boston’s Berklee School of Music in the early 1970s, during which period he connected with fellow Baltimore native Ric Ocasek, the singer, guitarist, and songwriter who had relocated to Boston. Hawkes became a member of Milkwood, the folk-oriented ensemble then fronted by Ocasek and also featuring Ben Orr; the group released its sole album, How’s the Weather, in 1972 before disbanding. Throughout the mid-1970s Hawkes performed with several Boston-area acts, among them the soft-rock group Orphan and Martin Mull & His Fabulous Furniture. Ocasek and Orr later refreshed their approach with a contemporary new-wave sensibility, prompting a reunion with Hawkes in Cap’n Swing, the immediate predecessor to the Cars. The latter ensemble secured a deal with Elektra Records and delivered its self-titled debut in 1978. Few tracks epitomize the new-wave era more than the album’s signature single “Just What I Needed,” whose futuristic synth lines were supplied by Hawkes. The Cars swiftly established themselves among the era’s leading commercial attractions, issuing Candy-O in 1979, Panorama in 1980, Shake It Up in 1981, and Heartbeat City in 1984. While Ocasek served as the principal songwriter, Hawkes received co-writing credit on two tracks: “This Could Be Love” from Shake It Up and “It’s Not The Night” from Heartbeat City. Additional original material by Hawkes appeared on his only solo effort, Niagara Falls, released in 1983. Following one further album, the 1987 release Door to Door, the band dissolved the next year. Hawkes had already appeared on Ocasek’s solo albums Beatitude (1982) and This Side of Paradise (1986); he subsequently contributed to Paul McCartney’s 1989 set Flowers in the Dirt. In the 1990s his session work surfaced on Propaganda’s 1234 and self-titled albums, Letters to Cleo’s Go!, La Peste’s Peste, Ocasek’s Troublizing (1997), and the Martin Mull compilation Mulling It Over: A Musical Oeuvre View. Hawkes also supervised the archival double-disc collections Just What I Needed: The Cars Anthology (1995) and The Cars [Deluxe Edition] (1999). In 2000 he joined his former bandmates for their first collective interview since the split, included as a bonus feature on that year’s Live DVD.
Albums