Singer, actor and broadcaster Bob Bright died on July 19. He’d turned 80 in February and was best known as half of the pioneering 60s duo Bobby and Laurie.
Bob was born in the UK and moved to Adelaide when he was eight. He was one of the early rock acts to make an impact in South Australia. Sixty years ago he teamed up with Laurie Allen releasing their first hit single I Belong with You in 1965. One year later they covered Roger Miller‘s Hitch Hiker which went to No 1.
In the late 60s the pair went their separate ways with Bob joining 3XY in Melbourne as a radio announcer. Laurie joined Bobby on air in February 1968 and the renewing of the friendship and professional relationship saw a return to the charts at the start of the new decade with Carroll County Accident via Ron Tudor‘s Fable Records.
Bobby and Laurie would perform together across the proceeding decades before Laurie’s death in 2002. Bob was also an actor, appearing in Homicide and as The Doctor in an Australian stage production of Tommy.
Bob Bright image from Facebook.
In 1971 there was an album featuring all Australian artists including Jimmy Hanna, Jigsaw (the Australian version not British version whi sang "Sky High"), John Williamson, Keith Humber, Matt Flinders (Louis Sylvan Bonet), Franciscus Henry, Frankie Davidson, Liv Maessen, The Mixtures and Hans Poulsen.
The album was entitled "20 Fable Chartbusters" .
Bobby and Laurie had two songs, "Through The Eyes of Love" and "Carroll County Accident". Two disinct songs and styles. The first sing was had lush string arrangements with bouzouki style guitar motifs and the latter was a country and western style of music. The vocal ranges were distinct.
I ask the question why such beautiful music is not part of the supposed classic hits repertoire.
Any re-releases of sings from the album in Ausdie mega mixes are in woeful mono.
I asked the producer of one of these mega Aussie hits albums why they were mono, he said that the original master tapes were lost.
Sadly the music of Bobby and Laurie were absent in these Aussie compilation albums.
So what i did was to digitise the album at 48khz 320kbs, denoised, depopped and equalised, saving as a high quality mp3 for persinal and private use.
I did it with my personal copy of the album pursuant to section 109A of the Copyright Act as anended in 2007.
Sorry about the passing of the other half of the duo Bobby and Laurie, Mr Robert Bright.
Anthony, Strathfield South, in the land of the Wangal and Darug Peoples of the Eora Nation.