As Gurubob mentioned, how quaint was this?

Being the 60's afficiondo that I am I am extremely happy they devoted some airtime for this show - as mentioned in the caption, definitely Australias FIRST teenage music show and started in 1959. Only 2 episodes survive in the ABC archives - the first one runs for 45 minutes and I have a coppy somewhere amongst my videotape archive. Of course that was the one I was expecting them to show - and to my pleasant surprise they actually dug out the 2nd one - unfortunately this one must consist of only one 30-minute reel so is incomplete - hence the sudden ending with the tell-tale film markers signifying the end of the tape clearly seen at the end of the transmission. This episode would not have seen the light of day for 50 years since it was first shown!!

Amongst all the good news concerning Countdowns I will definitely be thanking the Rage team for showing this!! It was transmitted 6 days before I came into this world - and I am now ancient myself by anyones standards!!

An absolutely magnificent artifact of how Australian music TV was in 1960 - I love the teenagers dancing, the shots of the audience in the ABC studios - yes some of the acts were pretty awful, but I was happy to finally get Johnny O'Keefe performing Don't You Know - a song that was recorded and written in the USA. And one of his best songs ever!!

I am alone here probably but I have to say I am so thrilled to see this for the very first time. The Rage team has made me very happy!!

Not at all Brett. While I love my 80's Countdowns and Rock Arena's I am pleased if they show material for all eras and I find it all interesting. I just wish I had kept the first few Hitscenes that they showed about 10 years ago as at that stage I was only wanting Countdown/Rock Arena and wouldn't keep anything else.

The only thing that annoys me with Rage Retro is repeats when we only have 25-30 hours each year and about 1000 hours of unseen footage. This week's episode has been superb.

Thanks Guru - I hoped you might have enjoyed it!! And yes, I can definitely help with any old Hitscenes you may have missed off Rage. Will catch up with you soon. I need to locate those "Night Shift" videotapes for you as well.

Cheers.

Brett, hopefully I will be able to repay all that. I have just gotten onto 2 more people who each say they recorded about 100 videos off TV of music in the mid 80's. One of them said they had recorded in long play so the quality is a bit down, but considering long play was 6 hours per tape there could be 600 hours of footage there - I am hopefully picking them up next weekend so retro season for me may run for a few months longer - I just love mid 80's Oz music TV. If they are willing to let me share them I will pass on to you as well. I won't know until I see it as I have gotten my hopes up in the past hearing about video tapes but never getting to see them.

I taped Six O'clock Rock only to show my Mother when she gets back from Holidays. She would have been 16, so it might have been right up her alley!

I was a bit worried at the start of this show, whey Johnny said what's in store for the next hour. I thought 'what the'? I thought it only goes for 30 minutes or so' - my disc does not have enough space!
Thanks for clearing up why it only went for 30 mins. A shame though that the other half is goooooooooone.

Guru - I didn't know VCR's had long play back in the mid 80's. I thought it was a mid 90's thing??? Also, how come your Countdown mag icon isn't on the 'Countdown Media' page (and the Countdown cards you showed us from a previous post?)

Also, I like these icons a few of you guys have put up. How do I do this? Can I use anything (countdown related of course) or are there copyright issues?

LOL - Guru, when I saw your icon for the first time, I thought that was Ernie Dingo on the cover. It wasn't unitil a couple of days later that I looked at it again and realised it was Shirl the Curl Geez he must have been sunnning himself a bit before this shoot!

Not sure when long play started but I have a heap of footy ones (I think I just imagined Jason cringing at that thought) recorded from 1984 onwards. The only thing is that they only had 3 hour tapes in the mid 80's as far as I recall, I think the 4 hour ones were late 80's. In the ad breaks they advertise Rank Arena videos having LP feature (Rank Arena became NEC in 1984 so they already had that feature then.)

I'm not sure why the TV Mag and cards are not on the media section. I had informed Jason previously that I had them but as he only likes 80's Countdown he didn't seem interested. I suppose they should be there if this is a Countdown tribute site that covers the show from 1974-87 but I'm not fussed. It's Jason's site so he can put up whatever he wants, I only really use this site for the forum anyhow. I also have a TV week from DEC 1974 that has colour photos of artists performing in the first few episodes. Troy was interested in those so I scanned them for him and he has them on his site.

If you want to put in an avatar just put it in the avatar URL space when you write a message. I do mine via Photobucket. I don't think anyone will worry about copyrighted images here. Mine is TV Times from 1977 as Countdown reached it's 100th episode. TV Times (and TV Guide) was swallowed up by TV Week in late 1980 - I don't think anyone from TV Week would know or care that they probably technically own that.

Guru?

What's this you have that I should be putting on my site????

Me interested!

Just a bit of Countdown paraphernallia like the TV Times mag from 1977 that I use as My URL as it features a Countdown front cover (right click and view image if you want to see it clearer), also the following which I had also mentioned in the "Harvey James is dead" thread:

I've seen the bottom one on Ebay before with Skyhooks :-)

I put them to my desktop and will add them to my site :-) THANKS!

In case you don't know they are a 1977 Popswops trading card, 1982 Vita Brits Write 'n' Wipe series card (there were 11 in the set) and a 1994 TV Week Classic TV Shows collector card.

What's the other 6 O'clock Rock episode in the ABC vault? I have look through the national sound archives website and there is 4 others episodes that is in there are -
August 1st 1959
May 7th 1960 that includes the Delltones doing Love Love Love
December 17th 1960 which includes Rob EG, Lonnie Lee, Dig Richards,The Fauns(who became the Flanagans) and the Allen brothers which included Peter Allen
MArch 4th 1961 which includes Bryan Davies, Jay Justin, the Fauns,Lonnie Lee, the dee Jays and others and this episode was hosted by Chet Clarke and Tanya Halesworth. so here is the info

It's sad and amazing that less then a handful of episodes of this show still exist - and we thought we had it bad as Countdown fans.

Early 60's pop holds no interest for me (interest begins post Beatlemania around 1965) but they are still enjoyable in a kitchy/retro way. The boomer generation really got screwed big time.

What is it with these stations (not just here but in the UK/US as well) just obliterating our cultural heritage

I have heard the possibility of why a lot of the early shows do not exist is that they were live broadcasts and were not recorded as such, it was just a straight out transmission.

They obviously must have recorded some as a couple of copies have survived. Whether there were just a few pre-recorded or live episodes or whether they recorded more is the question. The best way to find out would be from former employees at the ABC 50 years ago who were in charge of the recording and hope they are still alive and can confirm the procedures from the time.

Interesting that Luke mentions there are 4 episodes recorded on the National Sound Archives website and there are apparently only 2 at the ABC. If that is the case then you would think that the ABC, as the copyright holder of that footage, should be able to access their own material. After all they are both tax payer funded government departments so you should think they would work together.

From what I can gather you can buy footage from the Sound and Film archives but they charge $30 per second so it is a bit out of my reach to access an episode for approx $108,000.

$108,000 for an episode! They can have it. Unless I win millions in Lotto I would obtain a copy.

Your right Guru when you said they didn't record the live shows at the time as open reel video tape wouldn't have been around during the late 50's and early part of the 60's in Australia.

A friend of mine Ron Martin who was the first Electric Bass player in Australia played with the likes of Johnny O'Keefe, Col Joye, Johnny Devlin amongst others appeared on Six O'Clock between 1959-1961 and said the ABC never recorded the live shows. The only time they were recorded is when they had a special guest from overseas or well known musicians such as Don Burrows appeared so they can repeat that episode at a later stage.

It's a crying shame TV stations never preserved these earlier broadcasts which were available then.

It is sad that so much was lost but if 4 episodes do exist then you would hope that they do what they can to air them. I wonder what the ABC's relationship with Sound & Film is? Hopefully they can work for the greater good and make them available.

We saw how little was left of the 60's when Rage had their 60's night first up and were virtually limited to playing 1969 as practically nothing else has survived or was recorded in the first place from the era.

Has anyone got a copy of the 1959 episode of Six O' Clock Rock?

I'm trying to find a copy (preferably in mpeg2) so i can put it on a dvd along with the December 10, 1960 edition.

Hi Nathan

I have all the surviving episodes - the condition of the 1959 show is not great being made from a video transfer but I think the original may have faults which could be the reason it has not been repeated on Rage as yet. Not sure if I can re-dub it in MPEG2 format as it is on DVD but with the right software you may be able to. Leave me your contact details and I will be in touch.

Hi guys....I have added the first Six O'Clock Rock to my YouTube Channel and will be adding the other 3 episodes sometime this week if anybody wants to see them.

My Channel is Sallie6....just type that in the search and you will find me.

Sallie xox

Hi Brett - could you email me...would love to talk to you.

fairy_glitter@msn.com

thanks
Angie xox