Post 761 - Rory O'Donoghue - The Collection 1967 - 1981

 

"The Pogs" were popular on the wealthy North Shore party circuit in Sydney and also played university architecture revues. It was at one of these revues that they met songwriter producer Peter Best who helped score the band a recording deal with Festival Records subsidiary label Leedon Records. They recorded their debut single, "Claret and Tears" b/w "Heidi", in mid-1966. Both sides were composed and produced by Best (as were the A and B sides of all four of the band's singles). None of the band's four singles made the charts however, and in 1967 they were dropped by Leedon. "The Pogs" did make one further curio however - "Aboriginal Referendum Jingle (Vote Yes for Aborigines)" a tune in support of the "Yes" vote for the 1967 Australian referendum, also penned by Best. In 1967, "The Pogs" recruited organist Graeme Thompson and lost bassist Nino Bellantonio. Thompson was then drafted into the Australian Army and was replaced by Bruce Hadden. Drummer Paul Brownlow also left to concentrate on his electrical business and he was replaced by Greg "Max" MacManus. The band also changed their name to "Oak Apple Day" and went into a more psychedelic rock direction, influenced by bands such as The "Doors". "Oak Apple Day"continued performing in university revues, even touring with them professionally, and it was there that Rory O'Donoghue first collaborated with future Aunty Jack Show co-star Grahame Bond.O'Donoghue was also booked as a session singer for a single entitled "Moonshot" (released in July 1969, obviously to coincide with the Apollo 11 moon-landing), which was a crazy, fun, psychedelic workout replete with spacey sound effects and corny control tower instructions ("All systems A-OK!"... "Trajectory A-OK!"). The single was written by the duo Bannerman-Stokes on the RCA label under the name "Oak Apple Day with The Deadly Pair" and it has distinction of being one of the first 45rpm singles in Australia to be issued in stereo."Oak Apple Day" broke up in 1970 and Rory went on to play jazz before joining "The If" who performed The Who’s rock opera "Tommy". He also worked on the musical "Jesus Christ Superstar" before once again hooking up with Grahame Bond to play “Thin Arthur” in the hit ABC TV comedy "Aunty Jack". Rory formed the "Cool Bananas" sometime in 1973, original drummer Robbie Dearlove was replaced by Russell Dunlop in time for their first single, "Been And Gone", which was released on the Albert label.  Rory's other musical credits in this period included playing the lead guitar solo on the hit 1974 Kevin Johnson single "Rock 'N' Roll (I Gave You the Best Years of My Life)". In 1980 "Fatty Finn" E.P written by Grahame Bond and Rory O'Donoghue was released, Rory sang 3 of the 5 songs with his Mother Sybil singing on "Mean Woman Blues".On the 15th of December 2017, O'Donoghue's daughter Jessica announced on Facebook that he had died on 13 December. In a follow-up post the next day, she stated that he had been undergoing treatment for depression and mental illness, and had taken his own life in hospital. 

This post is a labour of love a few years ago I talked to Rory about doing this but at that stage I was missing a few songs to complete. Rory & I never met in person but had many conversations on Face Book about his music, the Aunty Jack show and he was always very helpful and nothing was ever to much trouble, he was such a friendly nice guy and I miss our talks very much. So Rory here it is and I hope you like it, R.I.P my friend. Image Marco Del Grande. Art work Henry DeRooy. Flac