Before the Boomerang Came Back - Various
Musical Aboriginalia (1949-1962)
RRH93

Before the Boomerang Came Back - compiled by producer Michael Alexandratos is out on all digital music platforms, including Spotify, iTunes and Apple Music.

Presented together for the first time are rare sound recordings of musical misappropriations of Aboriginal cultures, spanning the genres of jazz, pop, rock n roll, country music and art song, mostly recorded in Australia and by white non-Indigenous artists and composers.

All tracks have been remastered by Grammy Award winning audio engineer Michael Graves (Osiris Studio) and features album cover artwork by Tony Albert, courtesy of Sullivan + Strumpf.

The one theme tying the collection together is the often racist and misguided representations of Aboriginal peoples and cultures, through sounds, lyrics and music.

The album’s controversial recordings are set against the backdrop of the 1950s, a tumultuous decade in the struggle for indigenous rights, and during the same period when the first commercial recordings were made by Aboriginal artists.

It is hoped that this release will stimulate new perspectives and interpretations on material that represents an uncomfortable and difficult legacy in Australian music history.

More Information:  Artists Page

Johnny Wade
Hawaiian Crooner Vol 1 & 2
RRH88 / RRH89

Presented here for the very first time is the complete Hawaiian-style output of Australian vocalist Johnny Wade (1916-1993), transferred and remastered from original 78rpm recordings. 

Spanning two volumes - from Wade’s earliest recordings with the Sydney Hawaiian Club in 1937, to his final shellac recordings under Johnny Wade & His Hawaiians in 1956 - this reissue features the talents of electric steel guitar players Les Adams and Neville Kahn, all backed by Wade’s sensitive crooner-style vocalising. 

This release brings back into circulation recordings of a genre that deserves the same status and recognition alongside other Australian popular music styles of the era, including country and jazz. 

More Information:  Artists Page

John Munro
The Kelly Collection
RRR92

11 tracks: The Journey * A Different Kind of Song * They Will Be Waiting * Never Mind * Stringyback Creek * The Letter * Aaron Sherritt / The Outlaw * Get Ready * Glenrowan * The Trial * When Tomorrow Comes.

John sadly died, far too young, in 2018 after a long battle with cancer. All the songs on The Kelly Collection are written by John and recorded by Pete Titchener only a few months before John’s death.

Featuring musicians: John Campbell Munro (vocals, guitar and mandolin); Emma Luker (fiddle and backing vocals); Kathryn Ruby (vocals); Kathie Renner (piano); Eric Bogle (vocals); Pete Titchener (rhythm and lead guitar plus vocals); Paul Callaghan (vocals); Roger Montgomery (monologue); Khristian Mizzi (vocals); Rob McCarthy (tenor banjo); Damien Steele Scott (bass) and Jon Jones (percussion).

Villain or hero, Ned Kelly’s name still resonates in Australian history and folklore in a similar way to Jesse James or Robin Hood, and the question of course, is ‘why’?

Did he embody the anti-establishment working-class hero qualities engendered at Eureka? Was he the original Aussie battler, fighting against an unresponsive system to carve out a life in the bush? Was he what we would all aspire to in fighting for his family against injustice? Or did he simply cut a larger-than-life figure through many falboyant acts of generosity?

It’s hard to write him off simply as a ruffian, a thief and a murderer when his legend lives on so vigorously almost 140 years after his death.

So…. Ned Kelly, sinner or sinned against, was born in January 1855, four weeks after the monumental battle at the Eureka Stockade, to Red Kelly from County Tipperary and Ellen Quinn of County Antrim. He was executed in Melbourne Jail on 11th November 1880.

The events that occupied his short 25 years on this earth are the raw materials for the story we are about to tell. Some of it is factual, some has been interpreted from facts, some is debatable, and some probably fanciful.

But to begin at the beginning…

The Kelly Collection (RRR92) is available to download on iTunes or stream on Apple Music and Spotify and on CD through MGM Distribution or directly from Undercover Music via mail order.

More Information:  Artists Page

Robyn Archer
Robyn Archer: Classic Cabaret Rarities
RRR91

Robyn Archer AO is a multi-award winning artist whose long career encompasses singing, writing, direction and public advocacy of the arts.

An acknowledged exponent of classic European cabaret, Robyn was named Cabaret Icon at the 2016 Adelaide Cabaret Festival, and won the Helpmann Award as Australia’s Best Cabaret Performer 2013. She has performed throughout the world. Robyn Archer: Classic Cabaret Rarities is the arts and cabaret icon’s 11th album and her first since Keep Up Your Standards, a 1997 collaboration with Paul Grabowsky. Robyn Archer: Classic Cabaret Rarities is a selection of French and German shows from Que Reste-t’il and Dancing on the Volcano. Brilliantly accompanied by her two long time recital colleagues Michael Morley (piano and voice) and George Butrumlis (accordions and voice), most of these songs are rarely recorded, and certainly never in these translations - mostly by Morley and Archer.  The music is spirited and detailed, the content of the songs both hilarious and biting, and as a whole the album paints a picture of classic European cabaret very different from the odd amalgam which the word cabaret has come to signify in 2019.  It is not comedy, not burlesque and definitely not lounge; but it is very funny, musically exquisite, and Archer’s voice is robust, tender and typically articulate as each song becomes a little drama all of its own. Not for the superficial, this album is a genuinely rare treat.

Robyn Archer: Classic Cabaret Rarities (RRR91) is available to download or stream on Apple Music and Spotify from 26th April 2019 and on CD through MGM Distribution or directly from Undercover Music via mail order from May 3rd 2019.

More Information:  Artists Page

Keith Branch & His South Sea Islanders
Keith Branch & His South Sea Islanders
RRH80

OVERLOOKED RECORDINGS OF HAWAIIAN MUSIC MADE IN AUSTRALIA DURING THE 78RPM ERA

Keith Branch stepped into the Columbia recording studios in Sydney on 20th June 1947. The six recordings were made at an interesting point in the development of the Hawaiian Music genre and feature the combination of Branch’s sensitive steel playing, sparse accompaniment (guitar, uke and bass), along with crooner-style vocalising. Over 70 years later, his recordings are reissued here for the very first time on Rouseabout Records to download or stream through iTunes/Apple Music and stream through Spotify.

More Information:  Album Page