The Co-founder of the music group Mothers of Invention, Ray Collins, died after being admitted to a hospital for cardiac arrest a few days before Christmas. He was 75 years old.
Patrick Brayer, a close friend of Collins, told the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin that he died five days after he was admitted to the hospital.
Collins is said to have co- founded the punk rock band Mothers of Invention. But Collins was a known name in the music industry since the late 1950s when he sang for the popular R&B band Soul Giants. He then met Frank Zappa in 1961, after which Zappa soon joined the band. In 1966, the band was renamed Mothers of Invention, and the music was transformed from R&B to "Avant guard rock music," as reported by NBC News.
Collins is remembered for his songs "Freak Out!" (1966), and "Absolutely Free" (1967). In 1967, he quit the band, mainly due some creative animosity between him and Zappa.
In a 2009 interview with Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, he said, "I wanted to make beautiful music. I was raised on Johnny Mathis and Nat King Cole." Still, Collins reunited with his former bandmate several more times, including on the 1968 doo-wop concept album "Cruising with Ruben & the Jets."
Collins was born in Pomona, California and spent the last years of his life in Claremount, California.
Watch Collins perform Barefoot, by clicking on this link.
