I believe the history of popstar Collette via Australian Style Magazine, published in April 2000, deserves to be on the web and explored by those who may have missed reading it at the time. Writer Barry Divola interviewed key players in Collette’s success, including record producer Pee Wee Ferris, editors of Girlfriend, Hit Songwords, Smash Hits and TV Hits magazines, CBS record staff and many more. So grab your bell and ring it…Collette may hear the bells and fill in the gaps to add to her own story.
Cast of Characters Circa 1989-1990
PEE WEE FERRIS – RECORD PRODUCER, DJ
KATHY GRAHAM – DEPUTY EDITOR, GIRLFRIEND
MATTHEW HALL – ASSISTANT EDITOR, HIT SONGWORDS
SALLY HIRST – STYLIST
JAMES MANNING – EDITOR, SMASH HITS
CHRIS MOSS – MARKETING DIRECTOR, CBS
JOHN PARKER – PROMOTIONS MANAGER, CBS
EDDIE SARAFIAN – EDITOR, TV HITS
MAURICE TODMAN – VIDEO DIRECTOR
DAMIEN TROTTER – MARKETING MANAGER, CBS
JOHN WADDY – PHOTOGRAPHER
GABRIELLE WILDER – WRITER, HIT SONGWORDS
CHRIS MOSS: She was a model first and foremost. As I remember, at the time she’d done an ad for the St George bank.
GABRIELLE WILDER: At Hit Songwords we found her in a Joanne bra ad.
SALLY HIRST: I knew her as a model. She used to do quite a bit for Dolly and catalogues and things like that. She was always up, and she had good energy.
JOHN WADDY: I used Collette as a model before she became a singer. She was terrific. She had a lovely smile and was always enthusiastic. We used her a lot for fashion shoots, catalogues, retail ads. We did some underwear posters. She was terrific. She was blonde with brown skin and white teeth and a big smile. Then Ring My Bell took off and she cut her modelling career short – she could have become a very successful model if she’d gone another three or four years at it.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: I think because she was an ex-model, people saw her as false or manufactured.
CHRIS MOSS: Her partner Tony Briggs worked as a dance consultant for the company. He was a dance aficionado and knew what was going on. We’d all been part of the original Anita Ward single Ring My Bell, and Tony and Collette put the song down in the studio and brought into a music meeting one week to play to everybody.
JOHN PARKER: When we first heard the song, obviously a lot of us thought we were setting ourselves up here. But you couldn’t deny the fact that it was going to be a hit, and our profession is to sell records.
CHRIS MOSS: I don’t think anyone’s going to stand on a corner and proclaim she was a great singer, herself included, but as an artist with the right production and that type of material, it worked. There was a mixed reaction at the meeting. No one was hearing Aretha Franklin but it was quirky enough that I think most people thought it was worth giving a shot.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: Tony Briggs seemed to be a bit of a Svengali type. I think they were trying to tone down the boyfriend/girlfriend side of things.
GABRIELLE WILDER: I was going to say that she was the Spice Girls of the time but she wasn’t really that good. It was less than the Spice Girls. She was really trashy. She was a one-hit wonder. It was transparently obvious that it was the record company wanting to cash in on the dance thing. They got Pee Wee Ferris, who was – and still is – well known in the dance scene bit it was still appalling. She couldn’t sing at all.
PEE WEE FERRIS: I was originally approached with the demo and they wanted me to produce the single. I was doing some work for the record company remixing things. I did a lot of their 12-inch mixes around that time. Collette was their first step into trying to do a dance record, and I guess they thought “Well, he does that sort of thing, let’s get him”.
DAMIEN TROTTER: It sounded like a hit to me. Everyone thought so, and there was a major marketing and video commitment to support it. It was the right song for the time – up and bright and breezy and fashionable.
PEE WEE FERRIS: I had a feeling that Ring My Bell would do well, because when we first started playing it in clubs it worked everywhere. It was one of the few pop records that just everybody played, from the underground to the commercial side. Those DJs probably wouldn’t admit it now, but they all played it. Oxford St DJs, the suburban DJs, all of them. Of course, afterwards they bagged the hell out of it because her image took over from the music.
JAMES MANNING: There was a girl at CBS called Stacey Laing, who was quite instrumental in the whole thing. She and Collette were good buddies and she was very good at her job, especially when I think back to a lot of the useless publicity people who have worked for record companies over the years. I remember they brought her into the office, which doesn’t happen very often. It was a personal touch. If someone takes the time to see you, even if they’re a complete no-hoper, you’re going to remember them.
GABRIELLE WILDER: I had to interview her twice for one story because my tape recorder fucked up the first time. She wasn’t stupid. I think she knew what she was doing. You interview some of these people and they’re just vacant, there’s no one home. She wasn’t like that. She was a bit older, not like those 16-year-old Home & Away stars who were straight out of school and hadn’t had a life.
JAMES MANNING: It was good to have an Australian pop star. They were few and far between back then. Especially someone who revelled in it and didn’t give you this silverchair anti-star stuff. That’s alright but you need to have the other attitude where someone is like “Great! You wanna take my photo? Cool!” She was really nice to us and did everything we wanted. If we wanted quotes from people about what they wanted for Xmas or what’s your favourite Easter egg flavour, you could always get Collette, I’m pretty convinced the image she gave off was the real Collette. I’d be shocked if there was another side to her.
KATHY GRAHAM: I interviewed her at the CBS offices in East Sydney, and she smoked a couple of cigarettes while we talked. After I’d finished, said my goodbyes and made me way down the stairs, I was almost out the front door when I heard these footsteps clattering away behind me. I turned around and it was Collette. She said “Kathy! I almost forgot to tell you. Can you not say anything in your story about me smoking, because I’m doing an anti-smoking thing with the kids”.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: Everyone remembers her for the dance moves and the outfits. It make an impression on people for better or worse.
MATTHEW HALL: I remember she had possibly the worst fashion sense in pop music, possibly ever. And that’s not in hindsight. Even then it was stunningly atrocious, Whoever was styling her had taken the worst elements of that late ’80s English fashion scene and place it upon Collette’s shoulders.
CHRIS MOSS: She had a distinct idea about how she wanted to present herself. It wasn’t something that was created by the record company, Everyone put in their two bob’s worth, but most of it came from Collette and Tony, right down to the artwork.
MAURICE TODMAN: They knew what they wanted fashion-wise and I knew nothing about fashion, so I basically said “I’ll leave the bicycle pants to you”. It was all a bit new and fresh at the time. I thought she looked cute and spunky in it. It was like “Why wouldn’t a 15-year-old boy cream himself?”
SALLY HIRST: With the whole bike shorts thing, she pretty much knew what she wanted. It wasn’t like I said “You must wear this”. I knew her size and what colours suited her, and her style, so I went out and got a range of outfits. She liked brightly coloured things, at a time when most of the fashion was black and serious. She was very much the opposite. It was a bit early for the Spice Girls type market but you just knew the six-, seven-, eight-year old girls would love her. At this stage of the game, with groups like S Club 7, there’s a much bigger market for that style of thing. And she was doing dance music before anyone thought it was cool over here. Now there are a lot of similar types of artists who don’t get the bagging she got.
DAMIEN TROTTER: The bike shorts wouldn’t have suited me but they looked good on her [laughs]. It worked for the time – everyone was into that bright lycra look. You go back into every period of rock and pop and there are many regrettable episodes. But even the mullet’s coming back, I hear.
JAMES MANNING: There have certainly been worse looks than the lycra. Look at anybody’s old shoots and you’d be embarrassed.
GABRIELLE WILDER: Come on, she wore lycra. What else is there to say?
SALLY HIRST: I must admit, I haven’t looked at the photos for a long time. I think with any fashion, anything from five or 10 years ago is gorgeous. At the moment ’70s stuff is very popular, but in the ’80s, everyone thought the ’70s was the decade style forgot. Now it’s the ’80s that was the decade that style forgot. Everything comes back. But I don’t know – personally I think bike shorts should be for bikes.
MAURICE TODMAN: She had to put up with a lot of bullshit, people saying “she’s a model, she can’t sing, can’t dance, can’t do anything”.
CHRIS MOSS: You have to admire her for what she achieved against the pretty hefty odds. She got a lot of flak. People weren’t backward in coming forward. There were innuendos about who was sleeping with who in order for this to eventuate.
JOHN PARKER: I remember we went out to a club in the suburbs, and Collette got on stage after midnight in front of all these drunk guys. Every time she got near the front of the stage they would try to grope her and yell “Show us your tits!”. But as soon as she finished she’d say “Right, where to next?”, and off we’d go to the next place. I felt really sorry for her but she was a very resilient woman.
JAMES MANNING: I don’t know if there was ever any mass hysteria over her. Apart from in out office, that is [laughs].
JOHN WADDY: She did a gig out at the Horden Pavilion supporting Tone Loc. Afterwards I put my arm around her because she was crying. It was insane. People were yelling “Pack up!” and “Get off!”. There were all these rough, tough little kids giving her shit. She was just in the wrong place. That threw her confidence a lot, I’m sure. But she went through with it. She did what was required of her.
DAMIEN TROTTER: I think back then they were just thinking “He’s a dance act, she’s a dance act, this should work”. I can’t remember it too clearly but I think there was a hardcore hip-hop element in the crowd that maybe didn’t respond so well to the lycra look and the production values.
PEE WEE FERRIS: I DJed that night. With those sort of hi-hop gigs, it didn’t matter who you were or what you played, they didn’t want to know about you. You could play the latest hip-hop and it wouldn’t matter. The homeboys in those days would throw things.
SALLY HIRST: The concert with Tone Loc was the most ridiculous pairing. It was just the wrong combination. It was like putting Grinspoon with the Spice Girls. His fans came along wanting a B-Grade version of Tone Loc, and it wouldn’t have mattered if she was the A-grade version of Kylie, it was just a strange vibe. Anyone who liked Tone Loc wouldn’t have liked Collette and vice versa. It wasn’t the easiest night for her but she did continue through it, which impressed me. I wouldn’t have wanted to be in her shoes. She certainly learned what paying your dues was all about.
JAMES MANNING: I think they knew when it was over about the time we did. The game was up.
MAURICE TODMAN: There was one single called That’s What I Like About You. Actually, that was one of my favourite songs that she did. But have you seen the video? If you have, you’ll know why I cringe. By this stage I was beginning to run out of creative ideas. We decided to do it at Pelican Beach resort in Coffs Harbour. It was crap. We had this storyline with this guy chasing her on a Harley. It was just embarrassing. At the time I thought it was art. I have to take responsibility for it. Back then MTV got the record companies to nominate the worst videos made that year, and that one made it. I was actually flattered. I thought “At least we’ll get to see it on air”.
JOHN WADDY: After getting the big hit with Ring My Bell, she dramatically changed her style, the silly girl. She went for the new, current, trendy photographer from Vogue and they tried to make her something she wasn’t. They dragged her away from her fan base and turned her into the serious, wistful beauty instead of the energetic dance party kid, which was her market.
SALLY HIRST: I styled the early look, which I think had the most impact. Then she went for the more tasteful, gown-up image but, by that stage, I think people had decided she was a certain section of the market that unfortunately wasn’t making as much money.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: I remember we did this big shoot with her in a hot pink rubber outfit. But then she was voted “Dag Of The Year” in the readers’ poll, which was a bit of an indicator that we shouldn’t do too much on her.
DAMIEN TROTTER: You wouldn’t have to be Einstein to work out that it wasn’t going to evolve into an enduring career. It burnt fast and brightly and the writing was on the wall after that. But you can never be sure. People may have thought the same thing about Madonna after she released Holiday.
MAURICE TODMAN: The last video I made for her was This Will Be. I think it was the last throw of the dice for her by then. Not putting down her ability but it was just that the music scene was changing, and dance music was progressing into a different area. But her determination and her attitude at that time were even stronger.
JOHN PARKER: There were a lot of things that went off the rails. Obviously, the second stage of her career was hard to resurrect after we got a hit. Unfortunately, she couldn’t get past Ring My Bell. That song and video and the cover of the single were all part of the package, It would be easy for me to sit here and be cynical and take cheap shots but everyone put shit on her and the record from start to finish. You name it, people in the media and radio said it “it’s crap, it’s blatantly commercial.” It was just an aspect of the business that’s easy for people to ridicule – an Aussie girl who set herself up.
JOHN WADDY: She was a good-looking model who wanted to be a singer. people don’t like that.
SALLY HIRST: If you’re tall, slim, blonde, good looking and young, somebody is always going to hate you. There are people who will instantly think “She’s blonde, she’s dumb”, or “She’s pretty, she’s stuck up”.
JOHN PARKER: When the records stop selling, that’s when you’ve got no real ammunition to go back to the media to support the artist. It was a completely fan-driven project, Her video and public appearances fuelled the whole thing. When the fans stopped turning up, that’s when I think it was time.
PEE WEE FERRIS: A lot of people were quick to judge her but I think she really made a mark on local dance music. Ring My Bell had a huge effect. It gave local artists a chance and it made record companies spend more on dance music. It did more good than people will admit. It got to number three, didn’t it? How many local dance acts get that far? Also remember that records sold a lot more in those days, so it was harder to get that high in the charts.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: I was over in Bali last year, and this huge cassette emporium in Ubud seemed to be stocked with everything from 1990, like the second Collette album, the second Jason Donovan album, and all this other stuff from that time that never sold, and there it was just sitting there 10 years later. I didn’t even know Collette had a second album.
CHRIS MOSS: I was in a second-hand shop a couple of months ago and found a Collette album. Everything else was selling for around $2. But they wanted $10 for Collette. I thought that was hilarious.
EDDIE SARAFIAN: She’s almost like a buzzword. You say the name Collette and people still cringe. It’s amazing how many people remember her. I think she inspired more ill feeling than, say, someone like Christie Allen in the ’70s. But every generation seems to have one of those figures. They have the same sort of aura.
PEE WEE FERRIS: Dance music is not meant to be taken so seriously – it’s about having fun and dancing. You take it for what it is. She wanted it to be fun and happy…and that’s what it was.
JOHN WADDY: She was a very lovely, very sweet girl. I hope she made some money out of it. I’m sure the record company did.
Until her Aria top 5 debut single ‘Ring My Bell’ was released on CBS, many had never heard the original by Anita Ward. She brought a classic to a new generation. Recently a friend broke the news that Collette’s version was a cover version to a shocked colleague!
standing on the oz side 