Man of the people, friend of the stars...
Raymond Christopher Cokes was born February 24, 1958 on the Isle Of Wight, which is part of Great Britain. His father was an officer in the Royal Navy, which caused Ray to travel all over the world whenever his father changed army base. When he was 15, his family permanently moved back to the UK, but he didn't mind since he had already seen much of the world. By the time he was 20, Ray had turned into a punk, living with 6 other guys in a cellar. His punk-period didn't last too long, and he moved to Belgium where he had several jobs. One of that jobs was as a DJ in a disco and on a local radio station, playing records. That made him "famous" (well, locally) and he was offered to present a show on Belgian national channel RTBF. This show was where it really started for him, and soon he would be presenting programs for Sky Channel and Music Box.
In 1987, MTV Europe was launched, with Ray as one of the VJs. He presented several programs, including Ray's Request. On April 14, 1992 he got a new show at primetime, MTV's Most Wanted, which would be the show most people remember him for. The show won several awards, and had music, competitions, guests and lots of bullshit in it, but it was the funniest thing ever on MTV Europe. Helping Ray to make Most Wanted were Rob The Cameraman, Andi (another cameraman, often named Andicam), and Alain The Dictator (the director), amongst others. "It's crap, but we love it" had become the show's motto over the years, but even as they tried to live up to it, the show was far from crap. Sometime during his Most Wanted years, Ray even recorded a single, with the help of Al Agami. Simply Sexy was the name, and the cd single had 3 different versions of the song, each one just as hilarious as Ray's tv shows.
1996 was the year of change. Most Wanted had ended, and Ray returned once per week with X-Ray Vision, a 90 minute show with guests, live performances, and of course some crazy things. Unfortunately, it wasn't that successful, and Ray decided to leave the station in 1996. He went on to do a radio show in Berlin, called Voll Auf Cokes on Kiss FM. After that, he went to Channel 4, to present a show called Wanted.
In 1998 Ray got a show on Virgin Radio, simply titled The Ray Cokes Show. But, ambitious as he is, Ray took over London Calling after a few weeks. But Ray left in July of 1998, as he was not happy at Virgin Radio. Ray can currently be seen on French television, in a show called Union Libre on France2, in which he reports about people and culture in the UK. Earlier this year (June 2001) he also presented a show during a weekend on VH1, but that was a one-time-only deal. What the future will bring for Ray, only time will tell.