Vale Jimmy, Charlie and Eric - A Personal Tribute
April 30th, 2012JIMMY LITTLE AO, the true Gentleman of Australian music, left us on April 2nd, 2012 at the age of 75. From childhood spent with his parents in a travelling vaudeville show, he became a recording artist with hits including the triple-gold single Royal Telephone in 1963, Baby Blu
e in 1974 and the multi-award winning 1999 album, Messenger. Born of the Yorta Yorta people, he became the most popular Indigenous music star across six decades, and in later years an educator and role-model. After personal health problems that included a kidney transplant, The Jimmy Little Foundation was created to promote indigenous health and diet.
I first encountered Jimmy while promoting his work at Festival Records in the mid-seventies. Soon after, I would have the joy of occasionally playing guitar behind him onstage. Much later, at various industry events, I was always touched by his warmth and dignity. A true inspiration; may his music live forever and the Foundation flourish in his name.
Jimmy Little Foundation website…
CHARLIE LAMB, the “Mayor of Music Row’, died on March 7th, 2012 at the age of 90. He came from an era when the rules of showbiz were still being invented, not just by choice but by necessity. From carnivals to movies, from reporter to publisher, he took life by the horns and rode it to success! 
Amongst his many achievements, he will be remembered as the inventor of the “bullet’, now a feature of music charts around the world. He was there at the start of many trade organisations including the CMA and he was one of the inspirations behind the International Country Music Conference.
I was humbled to be invited to the 2004 ICMC in Nashville and to be honoured with the Charlie Lamb Award for Excellence in Country Music Journalism, presented on his behalf by Miss Brenda Lee and sponsored by Peggy and Gary Walker of the ‘The Great Escape’. It was fascinating to learn more about the life-story of Charlie Lamb and a privilege to have met this wonderful man in person.
ERIC WATSON OAM, historian and songwriter, died on January 8th, 2012 at the age of 85. As a young man, his first songs were recorded by artists that including Jimmy Little and later on, Slim Dusty. He was the first recognised historian of Australian Country Music with his two books, Country Music In Australia, volumes 1 & 2 published in 1975 and 1983 respectively (and combined as one book in a 2005 edition). With an uncompromising view of what constituted country music in general and Australian CM in particular, he founded Selection Records, the label that would further the careers of Reg Poole, Owen Blundell, Barry Thornton, Evelyn Bury and many other artists. 
When I first met Eric in the late-seventies, he was literally living next door, over the back fence in the Sydney suburb of Eastlakes. He encouraged me as both a producer (several tracks for various Selection artists, including an album for Dusty Rankin in 1980, Sunset Valley Calling, during which this photo of Eric was taken), a session-musician (including the Gordon Parson’s album, The Old G.P.) and as an artist (my version of The Bushman’s Rodeo on Selection would be a ‘Golden Guitar’ finalist track in 1982). Always he was outspoken about what he considered ‘authentic’ in country music and, while there are undoubtable exceptions, when when one considers the progressive dilution of the genre, one must always consider that perhaps “Eric Watson was right”.
- Bob Howe, April 2012
To most Australian music fans, the bare bones of the story of the Chambers family saga will be familiar: Mum and Dad take their two-year-old son and baby Kasey into the Nullarbor Plain to live a nomadic existence for 10 years, finally returning to civilisation and forming a family band, then stumbling into critical acclaim followed by 
DVD review 
Sony Music Entertainment Australia is pleased to announce its support for the victims of recent floods across Australia through the release of a special benefit compilation CD “FLOOD RELIEF – Artists For The Flood Appeal”.
(Mercury Records/Universal Music Australia 2755048)
In the mid-seventies, Australian rock music was beginning to find its own voice and local references were no longer just clumsy attempts at mimicking exotic overseas place names. Contemporary country music had rarely ventured outside the human condition to commentate on the conditions in which humans were forced to live. From the opening line of Way Out West (The Dingoes, Mushroom 1974), “Way out west, where the rain don’t fall…” things certainly changed. It hardly seems revolutionary now, overburdened as we are with songs about the drought, but back then it was a statement of national identity, the type of which had only been touched on before (Mansfield Hotel, Axiom 1970). Just as importantly, THE DINGOES were a rock band with a country slant that would gain recognition not only for their own output, but for the influence they would have on those that followed, Cold Chisel and Paul Kelly to name but two. More than thirty years after the band broke up, The Dingoes have returned with a fourth album, TRACKS, full of the atmosphere and edge that characterised their earlier work. Recommended for faithful fans and first time listeners alike. (Liberation Music LMCD0107) 
By contrast, the wait for the new KASEY CHAMBERS album LITTLE BIRD has been much shorter, a mere four years, albeit punctuated by the duo-release with husband Shane Nicholson (Rattlin’ Bones, 2008) and the family CD and book set with father Bill Chambers (Kasey Chambers, Poppa Bill and The Little Hillbillies, 2009). Kasey herself has said that this new collection of songs came ‘pouring out’ unexpectedly, at a time when she wasn’t remotely planning a new album. She has also noted that her desire was for the recording to “reflect the old style” of her first solo albums. Certainly the extra input from Bill Chambers and the fact that Kasey herself occupied the producer’s chair with self-confessed naivety, only adds to the charm. Guest contributions abound, but only make Kasey’s star shine all the brighter. (Essence Music/Liberation Music LMCD0109)
Kasey and Shane are just two of a stellar line-up that comes together on LONG GONE WHISTLE – The Songs Of Maurice Frawley. One of the major intentions of this three-disc set is to widen the exposure of the songs of MAURICE FRAWLEY, who departed this world far too early in May 2009. While there are many touching and stirring performances on the first two discs by friends and fans such as Sarah Blasko, Tim Rogers, Renee Geyer, Clare Bowditch Chrissy Amphlett, Dan Sultan Band and many more, perhaps the real revelation for many will be the third disc containing 21 recordings by Frawley himself, lovingly selected by former band members (the Working Class Ringos) and family, leaving no doubt that he deserved wider recognition as a composer and performer. Perhaps PAUL KELLY, who contributes a rambunctious version of When I Lay Down With You, says it best – “Maurice Frawley wrote some of my favourite songs. Great songwriters create a world. Maurice did – a hard-bitten, pastoral world through which walked a straight talking man, wide-eyed and willing.” (Liberation Music LMCD0105)
