Guitar player from Melbourne, Australia. Died May 1995 at age 36.
Best remembered for his work on lead guitar with Paul Kelly and the Coloured Girls and the Messengers, Steve spun a wide web of musical projects over the course of two decades. Having started out with garage bands Red Shift and The Shards, in 1978 Connolly formed the well-known Melbourne pub act, whose line-up included Spencer P. Jones (The Johnnys, Beasts of Bourbon). After short stints in Rare Things and The Zimmermen, Connolly teamed up with Paul Kelly on his acclaimed 1985 album “Post”.
Along with drummer Michael Barclay (Weddings, Parties, Anything), bass player Jon Schofield and keyboard player Peter Bull, Connolly was the sound behind some of Kelly’s most acclaimed albums, “Gossip” (1986), “Under the Sun” (1987), “So Much Water So Close to Home” (1989) and “Comedy” (1991). Connolly co-wrote crowd favourites ‘Darling It Hurts’ and ‘Leaving Her for the Last Time’. Connolly’s distinctive solos in “Before Too Long” or “To Her Door” are every bit as memorable as Kelly’s evocative lyrics and sweet melodies.
After the Messengers disbanded in 1991, Connolly blended his rock roots with the folk-Irish sound of Friends And Relations in The Troubles, as well as playing with and producing country rock act Sherry Rich and the Grievous Angels. Connolly also produced albums for the country-rock act Mary Jo Starr, Kev Carmody’s acclaimed “Eulogy for a Black Person”, co-produced and played on Archie Roach’s haunting and ARIA award-winning “Charcoal Lane”.
But the rock bug continued to bite hard. At a time when it seemed everyone else was playing funk or consumed by self-absorbed rock-star angst, Steve went back to his roots, playing simple, unadulterated, no-nonsense rock’n’roll. Enlisting former Divinyls bassist Tim Millikan, former Cuban Heels keyboard player Graeme Lewis on keyboards, and The Sacred Cowboys’ Stephen Fidoc on drums, Connolly formed The Usual Suspects.
Connolly was preparing to mix the 10 tracks The Usual Suspects had recorded tracks at Atlantis studios over October-November 1994 when he fell seriously ill. Connolly’s death a month later, at the tragically young age of 36, had a profound impact on everyone who knew and worked with him. It also strengthen his friends’ resolve to finish The Usual Suspects project.
A year after Connolly’s death, Tim Millikan bravely picked up the pieces and mixed and mastered the album. In the days before email and electronic file transfer, Millikan spent countless hours on the phone and fax and in meetings to finish the album, desperate to makes sure it emerged exactly as Connolly would have wanted it to sound.
The result of four years’ painstaking and sometimes painful effort, banging of heads against brick walls, many favours above and beyond the call of friendship, and several dozen logistical nightmares, Steve Connolly and the Usual Suspects is an essential listen for fans of guitar rock and an album of which Connolly would have been proud.