ROCK&ROLL
38 | Rolling Stone | RollingStoneAus.com May, 2016
RS ARCHIVETRIBUTE
N
oaustralian entertainer
hasachievedthesamelevelof
broad-basedsuccess–onTV,
inthetheatre,onstageandre-
cord–asJonEnglish,whodiedonMarch
9th, aged 66. English was perfectly at ease
with whatever role he was playing, wheth-
er he was hamming it up on the Chan-
nel9sitcomAll Together Now–playing
faded, jaded rocker Bobby Rivers in a nifty
pieceoftypecasting–orwinkinghisway
through 1000-plus performances of Gil-
bert & Sullivan’sPirates of Penzance,cut-
lassattheready;beltingoutsuchpsycho-
dramas as “Hollywood Seven” and “Turn
the Page” straight to the business end of the
charts; or rocking sweaty suburban beer
barns. His ability to move seamlessly be-
tween his many gigs was a rare skill, which
dated all the way back to his breakthrough
appearancesasamoody,broodyJudasIs-
cariotin1972’sJesusChristSuperstarand
rolled on for five decades.
Healsoopenedtheeyesofmanyothers;
in his wake, such notables as John Farn-
ham, Jon Stevens, Angry Anderson
andKateCeberano,tonamejustafew,
stretched themselves creatively and moved
beyond their ‘regular’ gigs – all four ap-
peared in 1992’s revamping ofJesus Christ
Superstar.Interestingly,whenEnglish
tookasabbaticalfromthestageroleof
Rasputininthelate1980s,hisplaceasthe
dangerous Russian with the serious mous-
tachewastakenbyDragon’sMarcHunter,
amoonlightingrockstar.Yetanothercon-
vert to English’s multi-tasking world.
Butnoneofhispeersshiftedbetween
formsassmoothlyasEnglish.Hewasa
natural, regardless of what role he was
playing, whereas you always got the un-
easy feeling many of his peers were either
dabbling, chasing the lucre or trying to re-
invent themselves. English didn’t discrim-
inate; he simply moved from gig to gig, for-
mattoformat,histoothygrinanddark
eyestheonlyconstant.
English’sjourneybeganwhenhefront-
ed Sydney band Sebastian Hardie for a
time in the early 1970s before finding his
first mainstream success with the Harry
M. Miller production ofJesus Christ Su-
perstar.Hewaschosenfrom2,000poten-
tial Judases. English stayed withSuper-
From the pop charts to TV
shows and the theatre, few
couldmulti-taskaswellas
Jon English.By Je Apter
star from May 1972 until February 1974,
giving a remarkable 705 performances,
sharing the stage with fellow multi-task-
ers Marcia Hines, Stevie Wright, John
Paul Young and Doug Parkinson. So
began English’s balancing act of a career,
as he juggled roles in the 1978 smash TV
mini-series Against the Wind with a hot
stretch as a recording artist: beginning
with “Handbags and Gladrags” in 1973,
over the next dozen years he cut 20 chart-
ing singles, including the hits “Hollywood
Seven” (Top 10 in 1976), “Hot Town” (Top
10 in 1979) and “Words Are Not Enough”
(Top 5 in 1978). “Six Ribbons”, written
with guitarist and friend Mario Millo,
which featured in Against the Wind, was
his biggest hit. He also co-wrote the ma-
terial for 1990’s Paris, which was record-
ed with the London Symphony Orchestra,
and staged several times between 2003and 2009. English sometimes cameod (as
“drug crazed axe-murdering hippies”, he
once recalled) in TV shows such as Homi-
cide. More recently he acted in ‘straight’
theatre, in a production of David William-
son’s The Removalists.
It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to
connect English’s genre-jumping success
to the 21st Century pop star of today, who
not only records, but acts, passes judge-
ment in reality TV shows, tweets, blogs,
Instagrams and saves threatened species.
A product of the pre-digital world, Eng-
lish kept his skills to the performance it-
self, but his infl uence on today’s Mauboys
and Goodrems is undeniable.
Singer-actor-comic-writer, English was
the defi nitive slashie, years before the term
even existed. Typically, the restless rocker
was in the midst of a national tour when
he died.BORNFOR THESTAGE
JonEnglishplaying livein
1980.Hehadastring of
To p 10 hits, including
“Hollywood Seven”.Jon English, 1949-2016