Ray Lovelock (Macross)

Ray Lovelock is a fictional character in the Macross universe. He first appears in Macross 7, and also appears in the movie Macross 7: The Galaxy Is Calling Me and the OAVs Macross 7 Encore and Macross Dynamite 7. He is voiced by Masashi Sugahara.

Ray was once an ace U.N. Spacy fighter pilot, battling rogue Zentradi alongside his best friend, Stephan. So strong was his friendship that Ray backed out of a relationship with a woman named Akiko, allowing her to marry Stephan, whom he regarded as the better man. When Stephan was killed in battle, however, Ray was left desolate; leaving the military, turned to heavy drinking. Disenchanted with life, he roamed the Galaxy, wandering here and there trying to find a purpose.

A pseudo-documentary on the history of the members of Fire Bomber (as seen in Macross 7 Encore, episode 1), containing dramaticised versions of events, shows how Ray's melancholy mood ended when he encountered a skinny young orphan, Basara Nekki, dwarfed by the acoustic guitar he carried everywhere with him. Basara's unflinching faith in the power of music and refusal to give up brought Ray back from the brink, and he became the boy's unofficial guardian; Basara's loyalty to him was so great that even when Ray was critically injured and tried to give Basara up for adoption, the boy remained by his side. What actually occurred was shown later in the same episode through a flashback: the drunken Ray is intrigued by the child Basara, whom he first meets as he is returning from trying to move a mountain with his song. Years later, Ray is working as a construction worker when he hears Basara's (now a teenager) singing; Ray confronts him and asks "How about moving mountains with me?"

And so the two found their own rock band, Fire Bomber, with Ray playing keyboards, and a micloned Zentradi, Veffidas Feaze, playing the drums; they were later joined by bassist Mylene Flare Jenius. Realizing the potential of Basara's music, Ray used his connections in the military to obtain for his young friend a customized VF-19 Excalibur jet fighter as part of a secret military project researching the effect of music on enemies during battle. His life became complicated when Akiko came back into his life as Fire Bomber's manager.

Solid and dependable, Ray often acts as the reality check for the younger members of his band and a semi-father figure for Basara. When the power of music against the Protodeviln is proven, he is invited by the military, along with the rest of Fire Bomber, to form the special squadron Sound Force with him as squadron leader. His plane is a customized two-seater VF-17 Nightmare, its control system modified to resemble a keytar with Veffidas in the back seat playing drums.