Johnny Ray’s Downtown
Perry Keyes
Laughing Outlaw Records
Sydney singer songwriter Perry Keyes’ latest album, Johnny Ray’s Downtown, tells tales of life in the city’s inner-city suburbs. It has earned Keyes his first ARIA nomination, for best adult contemporary album.
Sydney Morning Herald music critic Bernard Zuel wrote on October 5: “Perry Keyes sings about Sydney — indeed has captured the soul of Sydney — in much the same way Paul Kelly has done for Melbourne or Chris Difford and Ray Davies for London, Lou Reed for New York or Bruce Springsteen for New Jersey.”
Like the songs on Keyes’ first two albums (2005’s Meter and 2007’s Last Ghost Train Home), those on Johnny Ray’s Downtown are of inner-city life. They tell the stories of the dispossessed, disillusioned and marginalised — and the experience of those living hard on the streets.
These are songs of the gritty side of life in Sydney.
Keyes grew up in the inner-city Sydney suburbs of Redfern and Waterloo, and his latest album evokes the mood, feel and experiences of inner-city Sydney in the 1980s. Musically, it is clearly influenced by the likes of Reed and Elvis Costello. Lyrically, there is a definite Springsteen feel to the tales of working-class life.
Keyes has a real talent for crafting songs that capture authentic moments of life on inner-city streets. Each song is a beautifully captured story, with the compassion and authenticity of one who has seen it firsthand.
The album’s sixteen songs deal with a range of stories drawn from Keyes’ life experience. From musings over the destiny of homeless men taking refuge in the condemned hospital they were born in, to songs of young people dealing with the harsh realities of the street and family, to the teenage joys of driving around the streets of south-east Sydney, the album covers the whole gamut of inner-city life.
Last Ghost Train Home was filled with references to Rugby League and Johnny Ray’s Downtown is peppered with boxing references.
There is a real sense of the waste a young person’s life can amount to in the unforgiving atmosphere of crime and drugs. The experiences of boxers, young men fighting against each other, parallels that of many on the album: the marginalised and downtrodden pitted against each other rather than the system that creates their oppression.
Particularly poignant songs include “1982”, which deals with the effect of several generations of alcoholism on a childhood friend. “Queen of Everyone’s Heart” tells of a friend who suffered sexual abuse and ended up prostituting herself in the park opposite St Vincent’s Hospital.
“Pauly Roberts Scores a Car” is about a petrol-sniffing addicted teenager living on the streets, and “$35.40” tells the story of a young man who overdosed on Cleveland Street — and how his clothes, wallet and money were returned to his family by the police in a brown paper bag.
A limited edition book of Keyes’ lyrics accompanied by beautifully poignant photography by Johnny Barker has been released to complement Johnny Ray’s Downtown. The book adds another dimension to the stories told through the music and lyrics.
The photographs are of the areas detailed in the songs. Streetscapes and shots of housing commission blocks alternate with faces of the people of the city — commuters, homeless people, criminals and children.
Keyes’ personal commitment to social justice can be seen in his willingness to perform at events such as this year’s Green Left Weekly fundraising dinner in Sydney.
Keyes has accumulated a growing following over the years, many attracted to the social conscience and compassion of his music and lyrics. Johnny Ray’s Downtown promises to ensure this following grows.