Let the music play on
How Ray Parker reluctantly produced Mr Telephone man and Ghost busters
In 1984 and they Both topped the charts.
In 1984 Ray Parker Junior had semi-retired from music at the age of 29 due to the illness of his parents and he was looking after them in Detroit and he was really settling down there away from all the razzmatazz of music and show business. One day in Detroit while still looking after his parents he got a call from Jheryl Bursby who was In charge of Black/ R&B music on MCA label, he wanted wanted Ray to go to Boston and see New Edition but Ray was not interested in going to Boston so Bursby being a good negotiator offered to take Ray to the Bahamas to chill, an offer which he could not resist,Unknown to Ray Parker,New edition had a concert in Bahamas, on getting to Bahamas according to Ray they partied so hard that he did not see the band perform and after the concert members of New Edition came down to ask him what he thought of their performance and out of guilt he lied saying they were great.
Ray Parker ( image: Achetron)
Jheryl now asked him again if he was ready to produce the young fellas and Ray confessed that he still was not in the mood of writing a song /producing and Jheryl said to him you don't have to come up with a new track but an old track that Ray had produced but was not released titled Mr Telephone man, and so Ray and New edition all flew to Los Angeles to record the track which went to No 1 on billboard (r&b) charts
While in LA during the New edition recording session Ray got a call from an old associate of his Called Gary, an artist & repertoire manager for Columbia Records ,they were the ones doing the Soundtrack for the new Ghostbuster movie and apparently they had spent millions of dollars on Music for the movie but they were stuck because all the music they had produced for a particular scene was rejected by the director Gary then they had to put a call through to Ray who just like he Said to Jheryl of MCA that he was in no mood of writing/ producing a new song because of his parents state of health,Gary then offered him $50,000 dollars for Ray to stay and extra 3 days In Los Angeles to come out with a good tune for the movie and if at the end of the 3rd if he had not come up with anything good he can keep the Bucks.
New Edition (Image: wikipedia)
Ray feeling guilty that he can just get such an amount of money from someone and not offer Them anything in return set to work immediately, he eventually came up with a track but did not have a hook(chorus) and on the 2nd while thinking of a chorus, a commercial came up on the television and the idea of what he would use as hook came from the commercial. Ray then hired some high school girls to sing the hook and he submitted it to Columbia music who then gave it to the director who was happy with the song as it was exactly what he wanted. The song eventually topped the chart when it was released .
Ghostbursters (image: Pinterest)
