Normie Rowe - Ooh La La (1966)

(Robin Shaw - Micky Keene [Robin Scrimshaw - Michael Wiltshire])
 Australia (recorded in UK)
Original version
#2 Sydney #1 Melbourne #1 Brisbane #4 Adelaide #1 Perth #2 NZ

Single on Sunshine label, double-sided hit with Ain’t Nobody Home.

Recorded in London at Polydor: see also It’s Not Easy and Going Home.

Remixed for Australian release with added vocals recorded in London by The Playboys, who travelled to London with Normie but did not back him on the London sessions.

Playboys guitarist Rod Stone believes it was a condescending gesture to let us guys do the vocal harmony re-do for the Oz release, sort of to keep us happy because they never let us play on anything in UK while I was there with Norm. After Rod returned to Australia in 1967, the Playboys did record in their own right in London, but Polydor initially rejected their original material, as well as songs by the likes of The Loved Ones and the yet-to-be-famous Bee Gees, including a song called Spicks & Specks. Instead, they were told to get out around the clubs and hear what contemporary pop of the day should sound like. (Rod Stone, by email.)

The London sessions are also discussed by Alec Palao in his liner notes to Peculiar Hole In The Sky [2002] which includes Normie’s classic from London, Going Home. See Ace Records’ site for details of the CD.

Robin Shaw and Micky Keene (also spelt Mickey Keen) also co-wrote Mary Mary (with Ritchie Yorke), another product of Normie Rowe’s London sessions.

For more background on Shaw & Keene/Keen (real names Robin Scrimshaw & Michael Wiltshire) see Marty Rhone – She’s Coming Home.

Other Shaw-Keene compositions recorded by Australian artists include:
• Johnny Devlin – You Gotta Tell Me (1967, recorded in London, co-written by V. McKenna);
• The Ram Jam Big Band – Lost And Found (1969);
• Marty Rhone – She’s Coming Home (1968, #33 Brisbane).

Thanks to Rod Stone.