It was sad to hear that Ronnie died a few days ago. He was Australian but was so interwoven into NZ music he needs to be mentioned on this site.

Kiwis first saw & heard him play when he was in the Australian band the Pleazers. Eldred Stebbing brought them to Auckland in 1965 to be one of the resident bands at the Galaxie, giving the Auckland music scene a colourful dimension. While they were in Auckland the band recorded an album Definitely Pleazers.

From 1973 – 1975 he was the bass player with the La De Da’s when they were a trio (guitar-God Kevin Borich, drummer Keith Barber & Ronnie). He played on & got a mention in the 1973 song The Place (from the album Rock n Roll Sandwich) – the song about the legendary Sydney music venue the Bondi Lifesaver (as his alter-ego Rockwell T James).

Hey look back there up against the bar, isn’t that Rockwell T James the recording star?

Later in the 70s he recorded as Rockwell T James with Garth Porter (ex-Sherbet, originally from the Waikato) as producer.

It’s been a difficult few weeks for Australasian music: Max Merritt died, now Ronnie. As one of their peers said today, ‘every time one of them dies I feel a little bit of me dies too …’