Dr Hook singer Dennis Locorriere dies at 76
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- Dennis Locorriere, guitarist and co-lead singer of Dr Hook, died Saturday at 76 following "a long and courageous battle with kidney disease," his management company said.
- Locorriere shared lead vocal duties with Ray Sawyer across the band's entire 1969–1985 run, scoring transatlantic hits including "Sylvia's Mother" (Top Five in the US and UK, 1972) and "When You're in Love with a Beautiful Woman," which spent three weeks at UK No. 1 in 1979.
- Dr Hook also reached the US Top 10 with "The Cover of Rolling Stone" in 1972 and "Sharing the Night Together," the song Locorriere identified as the band's most enduringly popular track on streaming services.
- Locorriere admitted it "used to really hurt my feelings" when audiences mistook the eye-patch-wearing, cowboy-hatted Sawyer for the frontman — a dynamic that preceded Sawyer's 1983 exit, in which he said he had become "a product with a patch and a hat."
- Locorriere took over as sole frontman for the band's 1985 farewell tour and later toured under the billing "the voice of Dr Hook," releasing three solo albums between 2000 and 2010.
- Locorriere co-wrote "A Couple More Years," later covered by Bob Dylan, and "You Ain't Got the Right," covered by Olivia Newton-John, and was born in New Jersey in 1949 before settling in Sussex, UK.
Why it matters: Locorriere's death closes a chapter on one of the '70s' most reliable transatlantic soft-rock acts, and it underscores how easily the public eye can fix on a band's visual gimmick — Sawyer's eye patch and cowboy hat — over the voice actually carrying the hits. The man singing lead on Dr Hook's biggest records, including a three-week UK No. 1, was never the one audiences assumed was in front.
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