McCallum's music career began in 1967 at the age of 16. She began with the Jeff Bulls Jazz Band soon leaving to join the Big Apple Union, a Sydney soul band, which evolved into Dr Kandy's Third Eye, in which she shared lead vocals with Gulliver Smith, later of Company Caine. At the end of 1970 she joined Freshwater, a progressive band, who had achieved a certain level of notoriety with their 1970 single "Satan", a song about the Sharon Tate murders. Originally sharing lead vocals with Ian Johnson, by September 1971 she was sole lead vocalist. November 1971 saw the release of her first recorded release with her lead vocals on the bands final single "I Ain't Got The Time", a track that reached the top 20 in the Sydney charts. In 1975 she released her second and final hit single,here for you to download, "Excuse Me" b/w "Honk Honk" (AP-10476), which spent 42 weeks in the national top 30. This was followed by an album, Alison, which spent just two weeks on the top 100 album charts. The single was released on Albert and produced by Simon Napier-Bell. If you look at the pic of the label you will notice Alison's name is spelt "MacCallum" which is a nightmare when looking on eBay as you have to use both spellings to find her...oh the hassles of a record collector.
2 comments:
Hi Mr & Mrs Ozzie
Excuse Me was her 2nd hit single??? Well it was a hit single everywhere but Melbourne I suppose.
But her 2nd hit was actually "Superman" don't forget..which was her first solo record after leaving Freshwater..and it's B Side "Take Me Back" also charted making that her 3rd.
And if you're counting the Sydney only charting "I Ain't Got The Time" as her first hit, then you should count Superman's follow up "Ol' Rock 'n' Roll Boogie Woogie Blues" as Alison's 4th hit as it charted in Adelaide & Brisbane. Then her 5th & 6th would be "Would You Believe" then "Fire" which both charted in Adelaide.
All of these were on RCA Records
Then she went to Alberts & released "Excuse Me", but as you can see, by then it was actually her 7th hit, but certainly not her 2nd haha
And that's not even including her best known record 40 years later: The Labor party's rally cry "It's Time" which swept them into government in 1972 after being on the outer since 1949. But strangely that DIDN'T chart when released between "Ol' Rock 'n' Roll Boogie Woogie Blues" & "Fire"..
Anyway my poibnt is, that's a long winded way of saying Excuse me" wasn't hit #2 LOL
One of our greatest singers. Has me baffled why she was neglected. Yardbirds producer Simon Napier-Bell thought she was good enough when he was behind the desk for her recording of Superman
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