Ray Monette

Raymond Curtis Monette (born May 7, 1946) is an American musician, singer and songwriter.

Life and career

Raymond Curtis Monette was born on May 7, 1946. He started his career as a session musician with Motown. He was also a songwriter and, in 1967 Detroit started a band called The Abstract Reality, who released a 45 rpm single "Love Burns Like A Fire Inside". He formed Scorpion with Mike Campbell, Bob 'Babbitt' Kreinar and Andrew Smith. His name appears on Scorpion and Meat Loaf's debut album Stoney & Meatloaf (1971). For that recording, Monette co-wrote four songs. That same year, he played tenor guitar on "Evolution" by Dennis Coffey & the Detroit Guitar Band, and played a guitar solo on Funkadelic's "I Got A Thing, You Got A Thing, Everybody's Got A Thing". He was guitarist and singer for Rare Earth from 1971 until 2004 (with a break around 1977). Monette played guitar on one of Rare Earth's most memorable singles, "I Just Want to Celebrate" and was the guitarist on the gold-selling 1971 live album, Rare Earth in Concert.

In 2010, Monette played on the Phil Collins album, Going Back.