One of Australia’s most successful rock bands – Sherbet – is moving back into the pop culture spotlight, 50 years after it dominated the music charts.
Lead singer Daryl Braithwaite created some fresh excitement this week with a social media post saying he was recording vocals for a new Sherbet single, with fellow band member Garth Porter, at Rancom studios in Botany.
This coincides with the impending release of the Howzat! The Story of Sherbet film which was supported by Screen Australia.
Braithwaite, who had a highly successful solo career after Sherbet, announced early this year that he was retiring from touring after six decades.
Sherbet was one of Australia’s most successful pop-rock bands of the 1970s, forming in Sydney in 1969 and producing an extraordinary run of 20 consecutive Australian hit singles.
The band’s classic line-up was lead vocalist Braithwaite, keyboard player Porter, guitarist Clive Shakespeare, bass player Tony Mitchell and drummer Alan Sandow.
That line-up produced hits including Cassandra, Slipstream, Silvery Moon and Summer Love, with Shakespeare and Porter forming the band’s principal early songwriting partnership.
After Shakespeare left in 1976, guitarist Harvey James joined Braithwaite, Porter, Mitchell and Sandow in the line-up that enjoyed Sherbet’s greatest international success.
Their signature song Howzat, written by Porter and Mitchell, reached number one in Australia in 1976 and number four in Britain.
Other major Sherbet hits included Child’s Play, Magazine Madonna and Another Night on the Road, before the group reinvented itself as The Sherbs and had further success with I Have the Skill.
Sherbet disbanded in 1984 but reunited periodically from 1998, including a six-member reunion featuring Braithwaite, Porter, Mitchell, Sandow, Shakespeare and James at the 2006 Logie Awards.
Harvey James died from lung cancer in January 2011 aged 58, while founding guitarist Clive Shakespeare died from prostate cancer in February 2012 aged 64.
The group was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 1990.
