Hi All!

I am a  singer-songwriter from Melbourne. 

I have written songs since I was 15 - the earliest were novelty type songs with clever lyrics and catchy melodies - one of them helped me win the Judges Choice Award in the biggest talent competition around at that time - New Faces with  my song "The Best Things Around". This song was also requested for years after as "the baked beansong" since the last verse goes "I love to eat baked beans, they've got to be the best thing around". Why it was never picked up by Heinz remains a mystery!!

1982: After that I got a contract with Mazda Australia to be the face of the new Mazda Traveller Van ads, they gave me a lovely publicist (Mary Murphy) and some gigs, we recorded a single - "Best Things Around" and B side "When I Lay my Eyes on You." at Allan Eaton Studios in East Melbourne. John Hawker did the arrangements for big band for a heap of my songs and things were looking good ..... but they sort of fizzled out. 

I got work at The Old Vic Theatre Restaurant run by Vic Gordon (Matlock) who was a vaudeville actor from the old days in London - I sang and did some skits and funny voices. A year or so later I got an offer to make an album by a couple of advertising people who put their own money into it and I made the album and..... everything fizzled out again. It was hard to get traction.

I was in a barbershop quartet with Russell Bertha ( who went on to become Rusty of the Scared Weird Little Guys) . We were a hit at The Brisbane Expo of 1988 and played to 20,000 at the closing ceremony! We were a really quirky group and musically it was cool and funny.

I added Singing Telegrams at Flim Flams to my repertoire and  for a few years donned the Gorilla, The Hairy Fairy, The Hairy Devil ( I was very hairy)  and The Headless Chook costume ( I lost the head somewhere) and drove around Melbourne in all weathers to sing their funny song to the tune of "She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain".  I got lost a lot as I recall.

I had a couple of beautiful little daughters and we were poor but happy, except for the extreme poverty, which is hard to completely put out of your mind. Then I started recording with a couple of like-minded musical mates and we set up a studio to take advantage of all the work the 80's had in store for us. But it all went south when one of the "partners" ripped us off and stole the equipment.

1989 : My lovely son Joshua  was born. I got a job delivering books for the Apollo Moon Book Binding company. Why do they build bridges so low? The truck got stuck under one at South Melbourne and that put paid to that job.  I had some agency gigs for parties and venues during this time, but it was slim pickin's.

1990:  Still writing, trying to get a chance to write for advertising and sing on jingles, but you really needed to have recording skills and your own studio. And contacts. And money. I got a little bit of work through Mike Brady's (of " Up There Cazaly"  fame)  advertising company and this led to him signing as my publisher. And that led to my recording the 1994 album " The Heart's A Deadly Stanger". In 1999 TakeYou Back  was included on John Farnham's Anthology 3 CD.

I joined a corporate band and we gigged a couple of nights a week - we even played in Taiwan for New Year's Eve. Then I went to Darwin and Alice Springs for a couple of long stints  - partly because my allergies were so bad in Mebourne. But what I didn't realise was that in the desert there are many flowering plants that like to release a LOT of pollen. I was drawn back to Melbourne to be with the kids and have another crack at making an album. 

2002: I went to Japan as part of a Jazz trio (with Linda and Bill Cable) at a big 5 star hotel in Nagoya. While I was there I wrote quite a few songs sparked by observing life in that country. "Way Down Homeless Blues" was one. There were a lot of homeless people in the parks - failed businessmen sleeping rough under blue tarpaulins.  

After I came back from Japan a few good things started to happen - I got some recording skills for myself a start  - everything became more affordable. I got a job at Billy Hydes in the guitar department which meant a regular income. And one thing I know about is guitars. I love them and I love helping people find the right one for them!
I had a couple of offers from other notable artists to cover my songs but they wanted a cut of the royalties and a co-writing credit.  My publisher declined. But during these years I did back-up vocal gigs for Oz stars including Tommy Emmanuel, Renee Geyer and Darryl Braithwaite.

2003: I made "Touch" at Metropolis Audio with old friend and multi ARIA Award- winnning Doug Brady (brother of Mike). A song from Touch ended up on Australian singing sensation, John Farnham's album, for which I was very grateful.  In 2003 Sometimes was included on the multi-award winning CD The Last Time. Farnham won the ARIA for Best Adult Contemporary Album. So it was a great honour to be associated with this wonderful success.

I had the best gig of my life when I launched "Touch" - the room was packed with 400 friends who turned up knowing this was something I had put years of effort into.  I had a manager  who organised the publicity and I got a great band together, guys from the shop came together and played bass, guitar, drums. My old friend Kaye Harrison sang back up and so did Ali McDonald. My three children can all sing and they did harmonies on one of my songs too. Mike Rudd (Spectrum) joined us on harmonica. It was beautiful! Some of the photos on this website are from that night.

2005: I had a little accident as I rode my bike to home from work one day - a tree was across the bike path and in the dark I didn't see it - I fell off onto my head and broke my neck.  I was worried that I wouldn't be able to sing or play guitar, but the doctors did a great job and the day I got out of hospital Jim Keayes (Masters Apprentices) (photo here by Mike Rudd)  picked me up and I went over to record a session with him. Everything still worked fine.

With the advent of the internet I was able to enter a  few of the big international song competitions and subsequently won a stack of awards: -
Way Down Homeless Blues won the Blues Category of the International Song Competition in March 2006. I also won the International Unisong Jazz/Blues Award (July 2006) and The 2007 Billboard Song Competition's Blues/R&B  section. Way Down Homeless Blues also got up as a finalist in the Australian Gospel Awards (2007) and The International Music Awards.

Back home I also started getting recognition as a Blues Musician.  In 2007 I won Artist of the Year, Band of the Year and Song of the Year (Way Down Homeless Blues) in the MBAS Victorian/Tasmanian Blues Awards.

The Director of the huge international Billboard Song Contest wrote me a note which said "I know many great players and writers here in the states who don't capture the soul of the R&B/Blues genre the way your song did. An Aussie lights the way!!!" Mark Furnas.

And now I am entering a new era - I am auditioning for Australia's Got Talent - I got through the first audition round and we will see what comes next!  Whatever happens I will continue to write and play and sing.

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cheers,
Steve