Search - Various Artists :: Decade of Australian Hits: The 80's

Fun introduction to 1960's Australian music scene

Paul Tognetti | Cranston, RI USA | 10/22/2003

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Over the past year, I have become increasingly interested in learning more about the history of popular music in Australia. I have always been a huge fan of the Seekers and recently I purchased a collection by Johnny O'Keefe, one of the pioneers of Australian rock and roll. This 2 CD collection of 1960's Classic Australian Hits is the first in a series of three by Festival Records. There are 28 songs in this set and I guess I enjoyed about 2/3 of the cuts. What strikes me as particularly interesting are the large number of solo artists included here. Being from the U.S., I have no way of knowing whether this set is truly representative of the period. In the 60's in America, the charts were dominated by group sounds. As for the music itself, all but one of the cuts were brand new to me. The only track I was familiar with was Track 1, The Bee Gees debut single "Spicks and Specks". My favorite cut was Lucky Starr's version of the Hank Snow classic "I've Been Everywhere". It was a blast to hear all of the Australian cities and towns rattled off in rapid succession!!! And Billy Thorpes version of "Poison Ivy" was also memorable. Other cuts I enjoyed include Ross D. Wyllie's "the Star", Judy Stone's "4,003,221 Tears From Now" and Ronnie Burns "Smiley", apparently about an Australian young man being sent off to the war in Southeast Asia. What frustrates me about this collection is the total lack of any liner notes. For a collector like myself, this is a big drawback. But all in all it was fun to hear all of this music and I don't regret this purchase in the least."