Paul Kelly
b. 1955, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia. Regarded as one of Australia's foremost lyricists, guitarist and singer Kelly began performing in the coffee shops in Adelaide, but moved to Melbourne and formed the High Rise Bombers in 1977. That band gave way in 1978 to Paul Kelly And The Dots who managed to record two albums and scored a minor Australian hit single with Billy Baxter. The Dots suffered constant line-up changes which saw 15 musicians from various Melbourne bands pass through the ranks. The Paul Kelly Band followed in 1983, but the line-up changes continued and the group barely lasted a year. Kelly resurfaced with a solo acoustic album, POST which showcased his observations of the inner-city area of Melbourne. Encouraged by the response to POST, Kelly gathered together a band of high quality musicians, the Coloured Girls, who comprised Michael Armiger (bass), Michael Barclay (drums), Pedro Bull (keyboards), Steve Connolly (guitar) and Chris Coyne (saxophone). Subsequent albums have garnered more success and hit singles in Australia. The Coloured Girls were renamed the Messengers for tours and album releases in the USA and Europe, because of worries that the name had racist connotations. Ironically, Kelly is noted in Australia for his support of Aboriginal rights; indeed his Bicentennial was a scathing attack on the Australian Bicentennial celebrations as seen from an Aboriginal viewpoint. He is in the vanguard of singer-songwriters in Australia, his contemporaries such as James Griffin, John Dowler, Steve Hoy, John Kennedy and Billy Baxter have not achieved his level of success.