JPY ("Squeak") Wednesday 07/11/2012

Last night, on A Mixed Bag with Chris B, our theme was JPY ("Squeak").  This year John Paul Young has been celebrating 40 years in the Australian music industry.  He has also been with his wife for 40 years!

If you were a huge fan of the television show "Countdown", I'm sure you will remember John Paul Young singing "Yesterday's Hero", all dressed up in his cute little sailor suit being dragged down into the audience by screaming teenage girls.

Along with Kev Carmody, The Dingoes, Little Pattie and Mental As Anything, JPY was inducted into the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) Hall of Fame in the year 2009.  This year, he received an Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for his service to the performing arts as a singer and songwriter, and through support for a range of charitable organisations.

In the 1980s, when JPY's pop stardom had faded somewhat, John Paul Young spent some time working as a DJ.  Things changed when the movie Strictly Ballroom was released in 1992, and the song "Love is in the air", originally a worlwide hit in 1978, became a hit all over again, becoming JPY's signature tune.

Harry Vanda and George Young from the Easybeats penned many of John Paul Young's hit songs.

Here is the link to a telephone interview with John Paul Young.  He was kind enough to have a chat with us the morning after a JPY gig in Mackay in Queensland:-

http://soundcloud.com/chris-b2/interview-with-john-paul-young

Next week on "A Mixed Bag with Chris B", our theme will be "Streets".  The playlist will include songs with the word street, or streets in the title, e.g "Streets of London", "Where the streets have no name", "Dancing in the streets", etc, etc..

Last night's John Paul Young's song playlist included:-

1. Pasadena
2. Driving me crazy
3. Yesterdays hero (from the vinyl record "Explosive Hits '75)
4. St Louis
5. Heaven sent
6. Rainbow (by Elm Tree - JPY's first band)
7. Out of Time (Chris Farlowe - it's been said that JPY sounds a bit like this singer)
8. Where the action is
9. Isn't it sunshine
10. I hate the music
11. I wanna do it with you
12. Keep on smilin'
13. Standing in the rain (from the CD "Long way to the top")
14. Are you gonna go my way? (JPY on Andrew Denton's musical challenge 2, singing a Lenny Kravitz song)
15. Yesterday's hero (cover by the Bay City Rollers)
16. Love is in the air