by Ken Tuccio

The late-90’s will most likely be remembered in musical history as a cringe inducing era.

This is the period of time that brought us boy bands such as NSync, 98 Degrees, and the Backstreet Boys. It's a portion of a decade that frightened parents thanks to musicians such as Marilyn Manson and SlipKnot, and it’s also the era that introduced us to the pedophilic ass shaking of Britney Spears, the bubble gum sweet sound of Mandy Moore, and the frighteningly annoying tunes of the Spice Girls.

While all of the before mentioned artists and bands are memorable (for good or bad), there are many musical artists from the late 90’s that history will fail to remember.

Fifty years from now nobody will be discussing the amazing impact LFO had on the music scene, despite the fact that they informed America that Chinese food made them sick. In 2056 no one will be comparing the all girl group Dream to classic female artists like the Indigo Girls, and I highly doubt iTunes will ever play host to a greatest hits album from Soul Decision, even though Faded is one of the catchier bad songs from the late 90’s.

In the junkyard of bad music that is the end of the 1990's, there is one performer who always seems to be forgotten. This is a man who, in 1997, took portions of America by storm with a brand of music called "psychobilly". This artist reached the pivotal spot of #13 on the Billboard Hot 100, and he engulfed several minutes of MTV’s airplay with a hit song that was so catchy that you couldn’t help yourself from humming it for hours after initially hearing it.

That artist is simply known as Jimmy Ray …

Jimmy Ray is a British born performer who fizzled on the scene in the late 90’s with the insanely catchy tune, Are You Jimmy Ray?, a song that is not only addicting, but boasts one of the most random and out of sync videos in music video history; a video that I urge you to watch right now …

I love that video for many reasons, the most important of those reasons is Jimmy Ray himself ...

It’s hilarious to me that in the late 90’s, an era that was chock full of well dressed Abercrombie models who sang about falling in love, falling out of love, and falling apart because they fell out of love, a record executive in the US would think that they’d find success by signing an artist that looked like Elvis, James Dean, and Wayne Newton all rolled into one.

Jimmy Ray was a man with a sense of style all his own. He slicked his hair back in a manner that would make Uncle Jesse blush, he wore jeans tighter than Kim Kardashian, and he had a belt buckle that made him look like he was the WWF Intercontinental Champion.

Jimmy Ray was so insanely tacky that he was enjoyable to watch, and that video is a perfect example of that. The music video for the bi-polar anthem, Are You Jimmy Ray?, includes Jimmy Ray shaking his Levi-clad legs on top of a trailer while young cheerleaders do some sort of routine in front of a white wall, but if that wasn’t odd enough, it also included young girls wearing Flava’ Flav inspired viking helmets jumping rope, while also randomly showing images of overweight black women dressed in bright orange.

While the video is the kind of thing that would make any 'shroom-induced trip that much more psychedelic, the song itself is a tune that would annoy even the most tolerant of car passengers if you decided to loop it on your iPod.

Are You Jimmy Ray? isn’t a song that has any sort of message. The song doesn’t talk about love, loss, or the desire to find a love that will at some point be lost; it’s a song that asks a simple question, “Are you Jimmy Ray?”, a question that is confusingly asked by Jimmy Ray himself.

I can only assume that Jimmy Ray wrote this song after waking up one morning and questioning his identity, he was curious as to who he was and before you knew it an obscure hit was born.

Jimmy Ray’s career wasn’t much to write home about; he did have a few other singles that never managed to make the pages of Billboard, and by all accounts it seems that his career is now over. Granted Jimmy Ray does currently have an Official MySpace Page, but since he has less than 200 friends, I have to guess that he currently spends his days in the mail room of some office complex in the UK.

One can hope that he’ll someday read this Tuccioholic Tribute to his small contribution to the music industry, and I assume it will fill him with pride … or anger.

If it’s the later he may come searching for me, hoping to violently extract his revenge on my sarcastic self. Honestly though, if Jimmy Ray ever comes knocking at my door looking to shoot me in the chest with a sawed off shotgun, I’d probably smile, as I’d get to sarcastically ask him, “Are you Jimmy Ray?” with a smile on my face, prior to taking a projectile in the chest.