Normie Rowe: When radio doesn’t want to know you

Getting called up for national service effectively kiboshed Normie Rowe’s pop career.

But how does it feel, going from hugely successful singer to being given the cold shoulder by radio stations all over Australia?

“When I came back from Vietnam, I couldn’t get a guernsey. I just kept getting knocked back left, right and centre,” Normie tells me on the Food Bytes podcast this week.

Normie recorded a track for the World Song Contest called Elizabeth.

“The only radio market in Australia where Elizabeth was played was Brisbane,” he says.

“To try to get a record away was just unbelievable. Mark Rhodes from Astor Records helped me do the promotion in Brisbane. We got it into all the radio stations in Brisbane. It went to number one and stayed there for five weeks.”

“And yet, the music directors of the radio stations everywhere else in Australia … it got back to me that one in particular in Melbourne – (Normie pauses to laugh) ‘Fovie to noine, 3XY … it’s a foine and moild day’ – the music director said ‘Normie Rowe? Oh, he’s already had his shot.’”

“And I thought, well, that’s the attitude. You just look at what could have been.”

But Normie had the last laugh.

“Here I am, still working, singing, doing shows all over the place and those music directors are gone.”

Photo credit: Normie Rowe Facebook page.