Post 455 - Darryl Cotton & Heather Favell - Baby You're Changing / No One Wants To Dance

In July 1983, Darryl Cotton issued a duet single with Heather Favell on CBS, "Baby You're Changing" / "No One Wants to Dance" (BA 223077), and in 1984 he cut an album of rock'n'roll standards for the Hammard label called "Rockin' Good Fun" (which can be found at post #111). After this, Darryl retired from live performances for almost a decade, returning to television to host the Ten Network's Saturday morning children's show "The Early Bird Show", with puppet partner 'Marty the Monster'. In 1996, he toured with his old pals Russell Morris and Ronnie Burns, who was replaced by Jim Keays after Ronnie's retirement from music. To our dismay in May 2012, Darryl was diagnosed with liver cancer and sadly passed away on 27 July 2012 at aged 62.

Post 454 - Lucky Dog - Why Do Fools Fall In Love / Mr. Bones / Wake Up

Ross Hannaford has had many guitar picks in many bands such as The Pink Finks, Daddy Cool, Billy T, Rocking Emu's, Mighty Kong, Dianna Kiss just to name a few. In 1980 his band Lucky Dog released a one and only 3 track single here for you to download "Why Do Fools Fall In Love" (MA-7482). Other band members were Wayne Duncan-bass, Margot Barrett-vocals, Geoff Hassall-drums, Martin Lellock-guitar and Mike Krelle on keyboards.

Post 453 - Soffrok - Set Me Free / 2 O’clock In The Morning

Rick Turk started playing the piano when he was 5. He joined a band at 14 and they were doing school dances within a year or so. They ended up doing supports for a few of the well-known bands around Sydney at the time. The singer in the band, 'The Blue Feelings' went on to change his name to Marty Rhone. The rest of the band went their own ways and ended up in different bands. Rick went off to Uni to do a degree so that he'd have "something to fall back on." At Uni, he met a couple of guys through a mutual friend, who played bass and piano respectively. We found a great drummer and a group was born. We started off by being a backing group and they ended up with a recording contract with Alberts Productions ourselves. They couldn't think of a name for the group, but they were playing a kind of soft rock style of music, for restaurants, clubs and piano bars etc, so what did this really creative foursome do, they called it 'Soffrok'. No one ever got the spelling right at venues. They recorded 5 of Rick's songs but only one was ever released, "Set Me Free" b/w "2 O’clock In The Morning (AP-9848) here for you to download, actually made it to #40 on the charts with the help of producer Simon Napier-Bell. "We were off" - or so they thought - with dreams of tours around the world and giant album sales. But it wasn't to be. The band split up 2 years later. Other members of the band were Jeremy Paul and drummer John Proud.

Jeremy went on to join Air Supply replacing Chrissie Hammond when she left to form Cheetah. John Proud was drummer on the "Crystal Voyager" album and then joined Crossfire and the Leon Berger Band.

Post 452 - Gordon Franklin And the Wilderness Ensemble - Let The Franklin Flow / Franklin River - World Heritage

The Franklin Dam or Gordon-below-Franklin Dam project was a proposed dam on the Gordon River in Tasmania that was never constructed. The movement that eventually led to the project's cancellation became one of most significant environmental campaigns in Australian history. Folk rock singer Shane Howard wrote "Let the Franklin Flow" (7-259941), which became an anthem for the campaign. It was performed by members of his band Goanna and members of Redgum under the pseudonym, Gordon Franklin & the Wilderness Ensemble. It was released as a single with a B-side, "Franklin River – World Heritage", written and recorded by Bob Brown. Here for you to download is that 1983 single recorded for WEA Records and produced by Trevor Lucas.

Post 451 - The New Dream - Groupie EP

The Dream formed in 1967 by Alex Opitz and keyboard player Jenny Johnson, both from The Changing Times. In April 1969 the group was relaunched as The New Dream, and their style changed to exploit the current "bubblegum pop" trend; Glenn A Baker has written that their agency was grooming the band to take over from Zoot. They signed with Festival and issued their first two singles during the year, "Yours Until Tomorrow" and Catching Up On Fun", which made the Melbourne charts. Their first national success came with their third single, "Groupie", one of a string of successful bubblegum songs written by Buzz Cason, the American who also penned "Hayride" (the hit debut for The Flying Circus) and "Everlasting Love", which was also a big hit for The Town Criers. "Groupie" became a national hit. The band released 9 singles 1 LP and 3 EP's. Here to download is their 2nd EP "Groupie" (INX-11730) released on Infinity Records 1970. The group broke up at the end of 1972; with Alex Kadell embarked on a solo career, and Peter Reed joining Gary Young's Hot Dog. Thanks to Peter for this EP for us to post.

Post 450 - Barry Crocker - Danny Boy EP

Barry Hugh Crocker OAM was born in Geelong, Victoria. After undergoing National Service with the RAAF in 1955, Crocker toured with a theatre group and did the club circuit in Melbourne, followed by a partnership with David Clark (aka Dave Nelson), and performed in England and the United States. He returned to Australia to star in a TV musical comedy show called 66 And All That, which became The Barry Crocker Show (1966–67)[2] on Network Ten. Barry went on to become the presenter and leading performer on The Sound Of Music TV series, which earned him a Gold Logie in 1970 as Australia's top (male) TV personality. His singing talents eventually earned him over 30 gold records. Here out of 1968 for you to download is his EP "Danny Boy" (FX-11,586)recorded for Festival Records and produced by Joe Halford. Barry made his acting debut on a 1969 episode of "Skippy the Bush Kangaroo" and after that had a successful career as an actor, most notably starring alongside Barry Humphries in the title role of Bruce Beresford's "The Adventures of Barry McKenzie" and its sequel.