Pop Archives

Lionel Rose - I Thank You (1969)

(Johnny Young)
Australia Australia
Original version
#14 Sydney #1 Melbourne #1 Brisbane #8 Adelaide #1 Perth

Single on Festival by indigenous boxing champion from Gippsland in Victoria. Lionel Rose MBE (b. 1948), Australian of the Year 1968, famously won the world bantamweight championship over Japan’s Fighting Harada in February 1968.

Written by Johnny Young. See The Real Thing, another Johnny Young composition, and Johnny Young’s own recordings, for example Cara-Lyn.


Red herring alert: This is not the same song as Johnny O’Keefe’s I Thank You (1962), written by Alicia Evelyn, writer of JO’K’s I’m Counting On You.