Ray Sawyer, the Dr Hook & The Medicine Show member who sang the 1973 Shel Silverstein-penned hit “The Cover of ‘Rolling Stone,’” has died in Florida on December 31, 2018. Sawyer retired in 2015 and died after a short illness. He was 81. The Alabama-born Sawyer – who founded the group with Dennis Locorriere, Billy Francis and George Cummings – was a member of Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show from 1969 to 1981. A few years before the band’s formation, Sawyer lost his right eye in a car accident; Sawyer wore an eyepatch that made him resemble the Peter Pan villain Captain Hook, which served as the inspiration for the Dr Hook moniker. In 1970, Dr Hook & The Medicine Show’s demo tapes wound up in the hands of author and songwriter Shel Silverstein, who recruited the band to become a vessel for his music: The group would turn Silverstein-written tracks like “Sylvia’s Mother” and “The Cover of ‘Rolling Stone’” into hits and released two albums of Silverstein-penned songs, 1971’s Dr Hook and 1972’s Sloppy Seconds