DOWNLOAD NO.262 - JOHN MEILLON AND JOHN EWART

"Tap Tap" is a 2.00 min sing-a-long music hall number which accompanied the Oz movie "The Picture Show Man" starring John Meillon, John Ewart and Rod Taylor who all had a good time, it seems, hamming it up in the movie. The song is remarkably catchy and timeless but was relegated to the B-side, the A-side being the 3.22 min short version of the theme from the movie (which has been on a movie soundtrack compilation CD).

"Tap Tap" came out in 1977 on an Albert's single and has not yet made it to CD. It was in its day released on two vinyl albums, Australia's Greatest Movie Hits and the Picture Show Man Sountrack and as far as I know both albums have not been on CD.

The composer Peter Best best won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Original Music Score in 1977 for the movie soundtrack. Peter also wrote the music for another movie which starred John Meillon and Paul Hogan, "Crocodile Dundee".

"The Picture Show Man" is a witty comedy movie set in the 1920s and it chronicles the adventures of Maurice Pym (John Meillon), a flamboyant showman traveling the NSW outback unreeling silent films. Braving much hardship and heartbreak along the way, Pym soon clashes with rival showman Palmer - a loud-mouthed, super-cool, ever-smiling American (Rod Taylor)...and it is "G" rated.

On the Australian Film Sound Archives website there is an mp4 clip from the movie which has John Meillon singing and tapping in a music hall in northern NSW. The movie version is very different to the single.

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Jimmy Barnes came for a visit on the 9.10.2009 (his second) and he brought with him another set of classic lost Oz tracks which we are slowly converting to CD quality. Many thanks for this one Jim and for the others to follow...

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For download are 2 versions of the song - the regular 7" single and an extended version I have made which has an intro akin to dropping a needle on an old 78 rpm...which then unfolds into an extended remixed stereo version of the single.

They are in a zip file which doesn't have a password. Both at 320KB quality. Enjoy!

http://rapidshare.com/files/290911175/tap_tap_times_two.zip