Paul Kelly (Australian musician)

Paul Kelly (2007)

Paul Maurice Kelly (born January 13, 1955 in Adelaide , South Australia ) is an Australian singer-songwriter .

biography

After finishing school, Kelly moved to Australia and made money doing odd jobs. He started playing guitar and at the age of 19 he made his first public appearance in Tasmania. In 1976 he moved to Melbourne, where he first joined a band as a singer and then had his own band with Paul Kelly & the Dots . In the early 80s they recorded two albums and had a single hit with Billy Baxter / Hard Knocks before the group split up.

After two years with a new band but without a record deal, he went to Sydney in 1984 and recorded the LP Post there at his own expense , which was released under his name. The move away from guitar-heavy band rock to melancholic-acoustic songwriter music was immediately crowned with success. The album received praise from the music press and was also able to place in the Australian charts.

He then formed another backing band, the Colored Girls, who later became the Messengers, and the album Gossip followed . It was awarded gold and reached the album top 10. It was also released in the US, where Paul Kelly & the Messengers first appeared as the opening act for Crowded House and then on their own tour. Of the three singles from the album, Darling It Hurts also made it into the US rock charts (19th place). The following platinum album Under the Sun was even more successful, with To Her Door, its only top 10 single hit to date. The song Dumb Things was included in the soundtrack of the Australian comedy film Einstein Junior and was their second rock hit in the US (# 16).

Musically, Paul Kelly developed into a storyteller who also took up Australian themes and dealt with the indigenous people of the continent, the Aborigines. By 1991 five albums were created with the Messengers, all of which were able to place in the Australian Top 40. After five years, Kelly broke up the band because he feared that he would go down the beaten track musically in the long run.

In 1991 he worked with Aboriginal musicians such as Archie Roach and was involved in the original version of the later global hit Treaty by Yothu Yindi . The following year he wrote music for a theater production in which he also took part as an actor. More music for film and television followed. In addition, two live and two solo studio albums were released, which were also successful in New Zealand. He also tried to gain a foothold as a soloist in the USA and lived in the States for a long time.

The first greatest hits album Songs from the South was released in 1997 and was his most successful record with number 2 in Australia and double platinum for more than 140,000 copies sold. In the same year he was named best male artist at the ARIA Awards , the music prize of the Australian record industry, and was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame .

In the following years he published numerous other solo albums and repeatedly CDs with other musicians. He also wrote and produced for other artists. Among other things, he was also represented on July 7, 2007 at the Live Earth concert in Sydney . For the first time in 1993 and since then in updated new editions, his collected lyrics were also published in book form.

Discography

Studio albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		AU	NZ
1981	Talk	-	-	Paul Kelly & the Dots
1982	Manila	-	-	Paul Kelly & the Dots
1985	post Office	-	-
1987	Gossip	-	NZ34 (4 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Colored Girls
1988	Under the sun	-	NZ25 (9 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Messengers
1989	So Much Water So Close to Home	AU10 (10 weeks) AU	NZ26 (7 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Messengers
1991	Comedy	AU12 (12 weeks) AU	NZ24 (5 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Messengers
1992	Hidden things	AU29 (6 weeks) AU	NZ39 (2 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Messengers
1994	Wanted Man	AU11 (10 weeks) AU	NZ19 (7 weeks) NZ
1995	Deeper Water	AU40 (3 weeks) AU	NZ30 (2 weeks) NZ
1998	Words and Music	AU17th gold (10 weeks)AU	NZ44 (2 weeks) NZ	Sales: + 35,000
1999	Smoke	AU36 (4 weeks) AU	-	with Uncle Bill
2001	... Nothing but a Dream	AU7th gold (11 weeks)AU	NZ46 (2 weeks) NZ	Sales: + 35,000
2004	Ways & Means	AU13 (6 weeks) AU	NZ46 (2 weeks) NZ
2005	Foggy Highway	AU22nd gold (8 weeks)AU	NZ46 (2 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Stormwater Boys; Sales: + 35,000
2007	Stoles Apple	AU8th gold (11 weeks)AU	NZ46 (2 weeks) NZ	Sales: + 35,000
2012	Spring & Fall	AU8th gold (4 weeks)AU	-	Sales: + 35,000
2014	The Merri Soul Sessions	AU17 (8 weeks) AU	-
2016	Seven Sonnets and a Song	AU9 (4 weeks) AU	-
	Death's Dateless Night	AU16 (3 weeks) AU	-	with Charlie Owen
2017	Life is fine	AU1 gold (25 weeks)AU	-	Sales: + 35,000
2018	Nature	AU1 (10 weeks) AU	NZ40 (1 week) NZ
2019	Thirteen Ways to Look at Birds	AU43 (1 week) AU	-	with James Ledger
2020	Forty Days	-	-
	Please Leave Your Light On	AU3 (... weeks) AU	-	with Paul Grabowsky

Live albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		AU	NZ
2013	Goin 'your way	AU5 gold (19 weeks)AU	-	with Neil Finn ; Sales: + 35,000

More live albums

• 1992: Live, May 1992
• 1996: Live at the Continental and the Esplanade

Compilations

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		AU	NZ
1997	Paul Kelly's Greatest Hits / Songs from the South	AU2 × 4 Quadruple platinum (45 weeks)AU	NZ17 (6 weeks) NZ	Sales: + 280,000
2008	Songs from the South Vol. 1 & 2	AU22nd × 2 Double platinum (25 weeks)AU	-	Sales: + 140,000
2019	Songs from the South: 1985-2019	AU1 (... week) AU	-

More compilations

• 2008: Songs from the South Vol. 2 (AU:gold)

Singles

year	Title album	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)		Remarks
		AU	NZ
1989	Dumb Things Under the Sun	AU36 (7 weeks) AU	-	Paul Kelly & the Colored Girls
	Sweet Guy So Much Water So Close to Home	-	NZ39 (2 weeks) NZ	Paul Kelly & the Messengers
2000	Roll on Summer Roll on Summer EP	AU36 (7 weeks) AU	-
2019	How to Make Gravy How to Make Gravy EP	AU37 (1 week) AU	-	published 1996; Chart entry in January 2019

Other singles (selection)

• 1980: Billy Baxter / Hard Knocks (Paul Kelly & the Dots)
• 1986: Before Too Long / White Train (Paul Kelly & the Colored Girls)
• 1986: Darling It Hurts / Preaching to the Converted (Paul Kelly & the Colored Girls)
• 1987: To Her Door / Bicentennial (Paul Kelly & the Colored Girls)
• 1992: Rock'n 'Soul / Reckless (Paul Kelly & the Messengers)

Video albums

• 2008: Live Apples (AU:gold)
• 2013: Goin 'Your Way (with Neil Finn) (AU:platinum)

Works

• Don't Start Me Talking, Lyrics 1984-2004 . Allen & Unwin, Sydney 2004, ISBN 1-74114-317-9 .
• How to Make Gravy: A to Z, a Mongrel Memoir , Penguin 2011, ISBN 978-1-926428-22-2 .

swell

1. ^ ARIA Hall of Fame. Australian Recording Industry Association , accessed August 6, 2017 . 
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Chart sources: AU NZ
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Awards: AU

Web links

• Website Paul Kelly (english)
• Fansite for Paul Kelly (english)
• Paul Kelly at Allmusic (English)