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the violin at school.”

      “I hated the violin!” Ryanny said, “I used to purposely leave it on the train and in bus sheds but people used to keep returning it all the time. Besides, where would I get an electric bass?”

      “I know!” I said, excitedly racing to the phone. “We can buy Laurie Skewes’ ‘paddle’. He wants to sell it.” I rang Laurie.

      “Ten quid?” I said in disbelief.

      “Where else can you get an electric bass?” Laurie replied. “OK, we’ll be right over.”

      Ryanny was protesting all the way there. “What about the notes?”

      “Don’t worry, they’re the same as the violin,” I lied. I wasn’t going to be put off at this stage. “We’ll get Laurie to write the notes on the fret board in pencil. You only have to learn five songs for the band competition.”

      Except for the silly look on his face, Ryanny looked quite at home with the paddle hanging around his shoulder. We set to work teaching him how to play 12 bar blues. Ryanny was still protesting. “Jimmy will never go for it.” Just then the phone rang.

      “Keep on practising,” I said as I answered it. It was Teddy Lees from the Stoneagers. Teddy told me we had a job that night at Matraville and did I know any electric bass players? Did I ever!

      “I’ve got just the guy you’re looking for,” I replied as I looked across at Ryanny struggling to master a 12 bar blues pattern.

      Despite reassuring words from me, Ryanny stood petrified on the stage at Matraville RSL, looking down the fret board of his paddle. “It’s in C,” Roger Keyes the piano player called out as we were about to start. Ryanny checked the pencil marks for a ‘C’ to start on and we ripped into the first number. After a few bars Teddy and Roger looked back with big smiles on their faces. They had never played with an electric bass before. I had to admit it didn’t sound too bad at all! The only problem was that when they did a number that wasn’t 12 bar blues Ryanny just kept playing on through. Teddy and Roger didn’t seem to notice. They thought he was great. The first hurdle was over.

      JIMMY’S PLACE, MONDAY 17: This was going to be the real test for Ryanny and his paddle. I got the reaction that I expected when I tried to convince Jimmy and Ray about my great plan to “Get ’im for the band”. I could tell by the scowl on Jim’s face and the cynical look on Ray’s, as we struggled into Jim’s lounge room carrying our gear, that they weren’t impressed. This was the first and last rehearsal that we could have for the band competition tomorrow night. I counted in one of the numbers we would be playing and as we played the last chord, Jim looked around at Ryanny in disbelief. Ray started shrieking with laughter. “Ryanny can actually play that bloody thing!”

      At the end of the rehearsal, even Jim had to admit that it was sounding pretty good. He stayed up all night, cutting out pink cardboard stars to stick on Ryanny’s paddle so that it wouldn’t look too daggy.

      SURRYVILLE, TUESDAY NIGHT 18: The Band Competition: Nervously we stood and watched Johnny Devlin’s band the Devils. They were really great, and so tight! The Devil’s line up was Claude Papesch on piano and sax, Peter Bazley on lead guitar, Neville Chamberlain on rhythm guitar, Ron Martin on electric bass, Tony Hopkins on drums and Johnny Devlin on vocals. The Devils had a great little instrumental they used to start with called Devil’s Rock, which they recorded on the Teen Label. Johnny Devlin was played off with Link Wray’s Rumble while the girls tried to rip off his satin shirt.

      Now it was our turn. Somebody said, “Here they are, Ray Hoff and the Off Beats!” We launched into Little Richard’s Lucille riff. Ray came on in his white coat, and all the chicks started screaming. The crowd went berserk. The band sounded magic. Better than it ever sounded in Jim’s lounge room. We didn’t look too bad either, except for Darby who wore a Canadian jacket.

      Darby wore a Canadian jacket in case somebody thought the band was crook. Then he could tell them that he wasn’t really with the band, he was only just “sitting in”. Darby wanted to give the impression that he could play “the jazz”. Darby was an impostor!

      The band competition was a no-contest (we won!) but the best accolade of the night for me was when Claude Papesch, the blind piano player (Claude had been blind since birth and boy, could he play!), put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Great drumming, man — really solid. The band was a gas!”

      Part of the prize for winning the competition was a contract with Teen Records, owned by John Collins and George Hilder, who were Johnny Devlin’s management. George Hilder peered at us through his “Coke bottle” glasses and nodded his approval. He lined up a few paying gigs for us at Surryville, Phyllis Bates and other venues. We were quite happy with that. At least we finally had the band together. Things were really starting to move.

      The following week, August 27, 1959, I got a phone call. “Hi Leon, it’s Johnny O’Keefe. We want to put Ray Hoff on 6 O’Clock Rock.”

      “Wow, that’s great! What about the Off Beats?” I answered.

      “No, we can’t use the band. He’ll have to sing with the Dee Jays like everybody else.” A discussion then followed about suitable numbers that Ray could do and we settled on Freddie Cannon’s Tallahassie Lassie.

      But we don’t do it exactly like Freddie Cannon.” I explained, “We go up a semitone and ...”

      “Don’t worry,” JO’K interrupted. “You guys can come to rehearsal at the old church opposite the ABC at King’s Cross. See you Saturday morning”.

      Ray’s mother made him a purple suit with leopard skin lapels (what else?). Ray really looked the part and the number went great. The exposure on television would be good for the dance we were arranging the following week at the Lidcombe Paradance. We booked the hall and my brother Van printed the posters.

      The dance roll-up was more than we ever hoped for. Two of the girls in the crowd had “Ray Hoff & the Off Beats” painted on the back of their leather jackets. The band sounded fantastic. Even Darby took off his Canadian jacket! This was also my first chance to wear my 13 inch pegged black pants with the silver threads and, of course my green luminous socks. After paying for the hall and other expenses, we all ended up with more than £10 each. It seemed like we were finally on our way to rock’n’roll success.

      Our plans to make this a permanent weekly dance were soon dashed by the police. The Paradance refused to hire the hall to us again because the cops had complaints about the huge crowd and noise outside the place. To add insult to injury, Ryanny was also arrested for gluing a Ray Hoff poster on a funeral parlour. Such is life for a budding rock star!

      3 I WANNA LOVE YOU

      “I wanna love you each night,

      Oh, let me say I might,

      Love you each night and day”

      — I Wanna Love You, Doug Richards

      JON: Dig Richards & the R’Jays had become the first band to ever play live on Brian Henderson’s Bandstand and soon after in August, 1959, we started our own show, Teen Time at Channel 7, which was on at 5.30pm on Monday nights. We eventually ended up doing this show two nights a week for two years. It was our main source of income. The show was hosted by Keith Walshe, who dubbed me “the red headed terror”. The hostess was Carol Finlayson — a top sort! Teen Time was a great experience and features in greater detail later on.

      We were still using the same old gear so Barry and I decided to update. Seeing as I was working at Nicholsons, I got a 10% discount so I bought a Hofner electric guitar with a very thin solid body that I later fitted with the first whammy bar in Australia. A whammy bar was a tremolo arm used for changing the pitch of the strings as you pulled it up and down. Barry bought a new Premier drum kit. Almost immediately after that I got the sack from Nicholsons. I think the lady, appropriately named Miss Wolfe, who was in charge of the record bar, didn’t like me.

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