VICKI SIMMS

William Victor Simms, known as Vic Simms and Vicki Simms, is an Australian singer and song writer. He is from La Perouse, New South Wales and is a Bidjiga Man. His singing career began at age 12 at the Manly Jazzorama Music Festival in 1957, soon after Col Joye heard him as an 11-year-old singing at a football social. He released his first single (as Vicky Simms), "Yo-Yo Heart" on Festival Records in 1961 at age 15. A follow up single, ''I'm Counting Up My Love / She's Got Soul'' followed in 1962. After getting into alcohol and committing a robbery he was sent to prison. Whilst incarcerated in the notorious Bathurst Gaol he learnt how to play guitar and started writing songs. 

In 1973 his music was heard by a Robin Hood Foundation and they sent a tape to RCA who organised to have him record an album. This album was recorded in one hour with a mobile studio in the prison dining room and was released as 'The Loner'. It has been described as "Australia's great lost classic album of black protest music". After the release of the album, he was sent on tours of other prisons, shopping malls and the Sydney Opera House as an example of a model prisoner. After he was convinced, he was being used he refused to continue the shows.  After his release from prison, he has re-entered the entertainment industry. He has toured Australian prisons and in 1990 he toured Canada with Roger Knox and Bobby McLeod where they played in prisons and on reservations. In 1996 he released a covers album 'From The Heart'. Simms was given a Deadly in 2001 for Outstanding Contribution to Aboriginal Music. In 2009 his album, 'The Loner', was added to the National Film and Sound Archive's Sounds of Australia registry. Simms sang "Stranger in My Country", in both the SBS documentary and accompanying cd, Buried Country: The Story of Aboriginal Country Music.

SINGLES

''Yo Yo Heart / I Wanna Bop'' 1961 Festival
''I'm Counting Up My Love / She's Got Soul'' 1962 Festival

''Try To Understand / Back Into The Shadows'' 1973 RCA

''Hey Sherrif'' 1988 Enrec

EPs

'Yo Yo Heart' 1962 Festival

ALBUMS

'The Loner' 1973 RCA

'From The Heart' 1996 Bunyip

References

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vic_Simms