( * as part of The Seekers. It's possible that we should also be saying hello to Keith Potger here as he may have been on the first hit by The New Seekers. I can't find a definitive answer on that point but as we'll be discussing that record anyway it doesn't really matter ).
Chart entered : 7 January 1965
Chart peak : 1
Number of hits : 10 ( 9 with The Seekers )
Say hello to Australia's first representatives and arguably the greatest female voice to chart.
Judith Cock ( wonder why she changed that ) was born in a Melbourne suburb in 1943. She studied classical piano at a Melbourne university and also took voice training classes. She began playing and singing at the city's Memphis Jazz Club in the early 1960s with Frank Traynor's Jazz Preachers using her mother's maiden name. In 1963 she recorded an EP with them "Judy Durham with Frank Traynor's Jazz Preachers" although she only sings on one track "Just A Closer Walk With Thee" where her voice is fabulous but the material has no appeal to me.
By then she had started work as a secretary at an advertising agency where she met Athol Guy the bass player in a part time folk group The Seekers. When their male vocalist left he invited Judith to join and through the connections of guitarist Keith Potger , a radio producer they were signed to W & G Record and quickly produced their debut album Introducing The Seekers in 1963.
In March 1964 they started work on a cruise liner The Fairsky which took them to the UK. They were immediately snapped up by the Grade Organisation and released the single "Myra" on Oriole in June . The Carribbean-flavoured ditty sung in appropriately dodgy accents was written by the group and appears to be about a prostitute sleeping with sailors. Judith only flies solo on one verse and the primitive instrumentation, tone deaf singing by one of the guys and distracting grunts and whoops make it one best forgotten.
Nevertheless the group became steadily more popular through appearances on the TV series Call In On Carroll and were invited to support the now solo Dusty Springfield. She introduced them to Tom who offered them his new song "I'll Never Find Another You" and his services as a producer. The association bore instant fruit and the short , averagely pretty and slightly chubby singer with her three cohorts became unlikely pop superstars.
The Popular account is here Seekers. The review is insultingly superficial but there are some good comments on the thread. I'm not sure I buy the religious interpretation either.
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