Johnny O’Keefe is the once and future king of Australian rock & roll. It wasn’t just that he was the first Australian rock & roll star to release a record or the first to chart a single, the performer with the most Top 40 hits in the history of Australian rock & roll or the first to go to America – although he can claim all those achievements. Johnny O’Keefe - JO’K - was the first Australian to completely embody what it is to be a rock & roll star.

We see him now in that rare footage from the Sydney Stadium. His white suit glows with a supernatural aura and he arches his back, his left hand is stretched up to the gods and his head flopped back as he reaches deep inside his lungs for the last breath of oxygen. His leg in skintight sharkskin is twitching with the beat. He is completely given over to the moment and then in the cutaway we see the Delltones doing the backing vocals and the look on their faces says that they know they’re going somewhere else with this tune, into uncharted territory. You can see that everyone is completely in the moment; at one with the hysterical screaming of the 12,000 fans, in synch with the band that is holding on to the beat and there’s JO’K leading the charge into the deep jungle of unknown passion and frenzy and up the river to the edge of madness. And then it comes down again. Back to the beat before we’re off again on the ride of a lifetime. In that moment we know that we are in the presence of greatness. It’s a place that very few performers can go and O’Keefe did it thousands of times over. Australia had its own rock & rollers soon after Elvis Presley hit the airwaves in the United States. Many of them were creditable live attractions and some even made interesting records but there was only one Johnny O’Keefe. He embodied the wildness of Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis, the sex appeal of Elvis Presley and the versatility of Buddy Holly. O’Keefe could take the stage with any of them and frequently did, besting them on their own bills.

The JO’K story began in Sydney on January 19, 1935 when he was born into a respectable Eastern Suburbs family. His father was the Mayor of the suburb of Waverley and ran a furniture store. The former position was useful when JO’K came to organizing dances and dealing with local councils. The latter provided a phone, which John used indefatigably to organise dances and to hype his career to the enthusiastic press. John wanted to be a performer from his earliest years. Then, in 1955, Johnny collided with his destiny watching the film Blackboard Jungle that used Bill Haley and the Comets’ Rock Around the Clock as its final theme. Johnny abandoned jazz and swing in favour of the big beat of rock & roll. He played whatever dances and charity shows he could find. It was on oneof these gigs in September 1956 that he met American-born sax player Dave Owens. They formed the Dee Jays - the hottest rock & roll band in the country Mostly jazz players (Lou Casch [guitar], Keith Williams [bass], Catfish Purser [drums], Johnny Greenan [sax]) the Dee Jays were closer to the tough R&B than the more palatable country rock of the other Australians of the time. While the music was American, JO’K’s style was pure Australian larrikin. With more front than Myers, O’Keefe talked himself onto tours by visiting American artists. He talked himself into getting a song from Bill Haley on Haley’s first Australian visit and then he talked himself into a recording contract with Festival records.

JO’K’s first single You Hit the Wrong Note Billy Goat was a pleasant enough introduction to JO’K and has worn well in the intervening half century. Then one night in the summer of 1958 the Dee Jays were playing in the inner-city suburb of Newtown. A fight broke out in the street that soon became a riot. The band wrapped early and Greenan and Owens repaired home with a bottle of Johnny Walker. Conversation about the events of then night turned into an impromptu song. The next day John was enthusiastic about the tune and added some words and a piano arrangement. In March 1958 The Wild One (Real Wild Child) became Johnny O’Keefe’s first Top 20 hit.

Although not even JO’K realized it at the time, this was the first time an Australian had written and recorded a bona fide rock & roll hit. The Australian music industry as we now know it began with this track. Recorded quickly at Festival studios, with a live audience overdubbed, it was released on an EP entitled Shakin At the Stadium. The track soon became Johnny’s signature tune. It was also covered by Buddy Holly and the Crickets, became a staple in Jerry Lee Lewis’ set (he recorded a version in Sun studio in Memphis) as well as Little Richard. Although never charting in the US Top 20, the song has become a standard amongst many of the greatest rock & rollers. It has been covered some 80 times and appeared in dozens of films. David Bowie gave the song to Iggy Pop who recorded his own version in the mid-1980s.

Meanwhile O’Keefe pursued his career at a cracking pace. In 1959 he was cast as the host of the ABC’s show Six O’Clock Rock, Australia’s first rock & roll show. John was the presenter, producer and talent scout, bringing some of Australia’s finest jazz and rock performers to the living rooms of middle Australia.

The excitement - it was recorded live in front of an audience - and the reach of the show gave Australian rock & roll an essential platform. If that wasn’t enough, he also hosted a radio show, Rockville Junction on Friday nights. Within two years of his first recording, Johnny O’Keefe was a star. His shows were riots. On stage as well as in front of it. O’Keefe loved his audience and he pulled no punches. He followed The Wild One with So Tough - yet another hit. He started to branch out with rock & roll versions of standards like Swanee River and ballads Why Do they Doubt Our Love. By the end of the year he had cracked the Top 5 with Shout! Parts 1 and 2 that DJ Bob Rodgers says was too wild to program during the day. He hit #1 with She’s My Baby in early 1960.

In late 1959 JO’K took the unprecedented step of going to Los Angeles to try his luck. It was an act of extraordinary daring at a time when Australians could rarely get recording deals in Australia. JO’K talked himself into a deal with Liberty Records who saw his potential as the next Elvis Presley. He went into the legendary Gold Star studios with crack US session players like Barney Kessel and recorded She’s My Baby. It was typical of Johnny to try and improve the sound of his records and this clearly was a step ahead of the production on Australian records of the time.

In early 1960, JO’K went to the US to promote his first release there, a version of Chuck Willis’ It’s Too Late. It was a disaster and by the end of his time there his career was in tatters. He came home and went back on the road. On 27 June 1960 he was involved in a serious motorcar accident on the Pacific Highway near Kempsey and almost died. O’Keefe had extensive plastic surgery and the results were seen each week on Six O’clock Rock.

The failed American tour and the car accident had long-term effects on JO’K. By the end of the year he had suffered the first of many nervous breakdowns. The music was changing as well. The rock & roll craze started to wind down and O’Keefe branched out with a series of ballads I’m Counting On You, She Wears My Ring that showcased his rapidly developing vocal skills.

The next few years were amongst the most successful of his career. A series of charting hits and successful TV shows on Channel Seven cemented JO’K as one of Australia’s most popular entertainers. The Wild One changed his tack with the track Sing that is one of the standout moments of his career.

A note from the mastering engineer...

I started my career at Festival Studios over twenty years ago. As with every Festival studio employee over the years I have visited the JO'K catalog many times. When I was asked to work on this project, I agreed to do it only if I had access to all of the original masters. Because most of these masters are falling apart due to their age and are very delicate they are not generally allowed to be used. Some of the masters used most likely have not even been played since the sixties!

I was delighted when complete access was given to all of the JO'K assets in the vaults. I found every JO'K master tape and spent 3 long months sifting through them looking for only the original and best recordings. Unlike all previous releases no inferior dubs or copies of tapes where used in this compilation.

I hunted down, purchased and restored the original Festival Records Ampex 351 mono recorder which many of these masters were made on, but after a time and considerable expense, I was not convinced that this machine was the ultimate playback medium for these tapes. I decided to install an NOS mono AMPEX tape head block from an older 300 Ampex machine on to a more modern Ampex ATR 100 tape machine (the worlds best tape recorder) - something to the best of my knowledge has never been done before and certainly not in Australia. This combination of head block and machine achieved a much better reproduction of the masters than previously thought possible.

For the first time these classic songs are presented as a complete collection that have been mastered to sound like they belong together from the very start to the ends of these discs. This collection of songs is not just another compilation - it is a NEW album. It has been put together with an almost forensic process. Simply put this is the best Johnny O'Keefe has ever sounded and I am very proud to be part of the process.

Rick O'Neil

Senior Mastering Engineer

Turtlerock Mastering

THE WILD ONE A TRIBUTE TO JOHNNY O’KEEFE

Iggy Pop join forces with Jet in a rock ‘n’ roll tour de force as they revisit Johnny O’Keefe’s iconic ‘The Wild One’, fifty years after its initial release to pay tribute to Australia’s king of rock ‘n’ roll.

The result? “Two minutes of modern punk rock genius” (Patrick Donovan – Rolling Stone July 2008)

Iggy Pop and Jet recently came together in Iggy’s hometown, Miami to record the ‘The Wild One’ at the Hit Factory Studios. Both performers have been influenced by Johnny O’Keefe, while Iggy Pop covered the song in the 80’s, The Jet boys grew up listening to Iggy’s cover.

“My introduction to Johnny O’Keefe came through Iggy Pop covering this song,” says Jet’s Nic Cester.

“Although I don’t think we have been directly influenced by Johnny O’Keefe, the ripples that he created are enormous. If the only thing that comes of this is just alerting other Australians that this existed, that’s a good thing”

Michael Parisi, President A&R, Warner Music Australia who instigated the collaboration says of the pairing,“JO’K and Iggy did have a lot in common, the only difference being that Iggy lived to tell his tale…we’re talking real rock & roll outlaws here. Jet just embody the whole Oz rock attitude. They eat, breathe and live the dream.”

Jet and Iggy Pop’s version of ‘The Wild One’ will be included as a bonus track on the forthcoming album release ‘Johnny O’Keefe – The Wild One’ – available from August 23, 2008. For the first time JO’K’s classic songs are presented as a complete remastered collection as a tribute to Johnny O’Keefe’s extraordinary career - simply put, this is the best Johnny O'Keefe has ever sounded.

“Like the best rock songs, Johnny O’Keefe’s ‘The Wild One’ is timeless in its universal appeal to angst-ridden teenagers…it still resonates fifty years on – its cocksure words and carefree attitude still encapsulate the rock & roll spirit.”