Rick Davies, the legendary co-founder and lead vocalist of the British rock band Supertramp, died on Saturday, September 6, 2025, at the age of 81 after a long and courageous battle with multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer. The news, confirmed by his bandmates and family, marks the end of an era for progressive rock and art-pop, genres Davies helped shape and define over five decades of musical innovation.
Born Richard Davies on July 22, 1944, in Swindon, England, Davies grew up in a working-class family. His father, a bomb disposal expert and merchant seaman, and his mother, a hairdresser, encouraged his early love for music. According to The New York Times, Davies’s fascination with rhythm began when he discovered a Gene Krupa album as a child. He started out on drums, inspired by Krupa’s “Drummin’ Man,” but soon taught himself piano after realizing the instrument felt "right" for him. "Suddenly people were responding to me," Davies once recalled in a 1997 interview with Pop Culture Classics, reflecting on his growing confidence as a performer.
Davies’s early career saw him playing in local bands like Vince and the Vigilantes and Rick’s Blues while attending art school. By the mid-1960s, he was playing organ with a group called the Joint, which was supported by Dutch millionaire Stanley August Miesegaes. Miesegaes recognized Davies’s talent and encouraged him to start his own band. In 1969, Davies placed a classified ad in Melody Maker magazine seeking musicians for what he called a “genuine opportunity.” A 19-year-old Roger Hodgson answered, and together, they formed the nucleus of what would become Supertramp.
The band, originally called Daddy, practiced in a Kent farmhouse and went through several lineup changes before settling on the name Supertramp—suggested by early member Richard Palmer, inspired by W.H. Davies’s book The Autobiography of a Super-Tramp. The group’s first two albums, Supertramp (1970) and Indelibly Stamped (1971), failed to gain traction, and Miesegaes withdrew his financial support. But instead of folding, the band pivoted toward a poppier sound, leading to their breakthrough with 1974’s Crime of the Century.
That album, featuring Davies-penned tracks like “Bloody Well Right” and “School,” went gold and set the stage for Supertramp’s ascent. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Davies’s soulful vocals and his signature touch on the Wurlitzer electric piano became the heartbeat of the band’s sound, providing a foundation for the group’s unique blend of progressive rock and melodic pop. “As co-writer, along with partner Roger Hodgson, he was the voice and pianist behind Supertramp’s most iconic songs, leaving an indelible mark on rock music history,” the band said in a statement posted after his passing.
Supertramp’s creative magic stemmed from the dynamic—and sometimes tense—partnership between Davies and Hodgson. Davies, with his acerbic, world-weary tone, contrasted sharply with Hodgson’s idealistic, melodic style. “We’re both oddballs, and we’ve never been able to communicate too much on a verbal level,” Hodgson once said, while Davies described their relationship as, “It gets to be a very personal thing. I don’t think that half of the frustration that I feel sometimes has ever come out as much as it can.” Despite these differences, their collaboration produced some of the most memorable tracks of the 1970s and early 1980s.
Supertramp’s commercial breakthrough came with the 1977 album Even in the Quietest Moments, which reached No. 16 on the Billboard 200. But it was 1979’s Breakfast in America that catapulted the band to global superstardom. The album, a playful yet incisive look at American culture, spent six weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and sold over 18 million copies worldwide. It spawned three Billboard Hot 100 singles, including “The Logical Song,” “Take the Long Way Home,” and “Goodbye Stranger”—the latter written and sung by Davies, reaching No. 15 on the charts. Breakfast in America also earned Supertramp two Grammy Awards, cementing their place in the rock pantheon.
Davies’s lyrics often reflected his sharp wit and skepticism. “Bloody Well Right,” a biting critique of Britain’s privileged class, became the band’s first hit, reaching No. 35 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1975. His intricate piano work and world-weary baritone were key ingredients in tracks like “Goodbye Stranger,” where his jaded delivery played off Hodgson’s vibrant falsetto. As Rolling Stone once put it, Breakfast in America was “a textbook-perfect album of post-Beatles, keyboard-centered English art rock that strikes the shrewdest possible balance between quasi-symphonic classicism and rock ’n’ roll.”
Despite their success, the creative divide between Davies and Hodgson grew. Their last album together, 1982’s …Famous Last Words…, presaged Hodgson’s departure for a solo career. Supertramp, however, did not end. Davies reconstituted the band, releasing Brother Where You Bound in 1985, which featured Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour, and continued to tour and record with various lineups. The band’s final studio album, Slow Motion, arrived in 2002, and their last performance was in Carcassonne, France, in 2011.
In 2015, Davies revealed he had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma, forcing the cancellation of Supertramp’s European tour. Health challenges made touring impossible, but his passion for music never waned. He continued to play locally with a group of friends known as Ricky and the Rockets, delighting fans with his enduring talent and love for performance.
Davies spent his final years at his home in East Hampton, New York, cared for by his wife Sue, to whom he was devoted for over five decades. She survives him as his only immediate family. The band’s tribute, quoting his lyrics, read: “goodbye stranger, it’s been nice, hope you find your paradise.”
Rick Davies’s music remains timeless, inspiring generations of musicians and fans alike. His soulful voice, signature Wurlitzer sound, and indomitable creative spirit ensured that Supertramp’s songs will live on—proof, as his bandmates said, that great songs never die.
