Dave Dobbyn

Dave Dobbyn, ONZM (born 3 January 1957) is an award-winning musician, singer-songwriter and record producer from New Zealand.

Th' Dudes

Dobbyn's first success came with a band, Th'Dudes, which he formed while still at Sacred Heart College in the suburb of Glen Innes, Auckland. The band's hit "Be Mine Tonight" won single of the year in 1979 in New Zealand, while singles "Walking in Light" and "Bliss" was a popular album

DD Smash

After Th'Dudes folded, Dobbyn formed DD Smash, and had a number of hit singles during the 1980s, including "Devil you Know", "Outlook for Thursday", "Magic (What She Do)" and "Whaling".

Solo career

When DD Smash folded, Dobbyn began a successful solo career, first writing the music for the Footrot Flats film in 1985, which contained two hit singles: "Oughta Be in Love" and "Slice of Heaven". After the release of the film, Slice of Heaven became Dobbyn's best-known song, frequently used in tourism advertisements aired on Australian television which encouraged people to go to New Zealand as a holiday destination. As a result, many Australians jokingly referred to the song as the New Zealand National anthem.

Since 1988 Dobbyn has released 7 solo-albums and a compilation, including the hit song "Loyal" (1988) which became the tongue-in-cheek anthem for Team New Zealand's failed 2003 America's Cup defence. He has also produced albums for Grant McLennan and has contributed on albums by, amongst others, Jenny Morris, Gyan and Bic Runga. He has also toured with Runga and Tim Finn, and a live album, Together in Concert: Live, was released in 2000. Dobbyn's album Available Light, released in 2005, received popular and critical acclaim. His 2008 release Anotherland entered the NZ Top 40 Album Charts at Number 2 and remained in the charts for 6 weeks, eventually attaining Gold status.

Personal life

He is a born-again Christian and has, for most of his career, been happily married to long time sweetheart Anneliesje, with whom he has two children Grace and Eli.

Controversy

In December 1984, DD Smash were playing an outdoor concert in Aotea Square in Auckland. During their set there was a power failure leading sections of the crowd to become restless. Some of the crowd started throwing beer bottles and police arrested them. The situation escalated and the riot squad was called in. Dobbyn made negative remarks about the police which allegedly spurred on the crowd. The concert was stopped by the police and sections of the crowd rioted, smashing shop windows along Queen Street. Prime Minister David Lange called a commission of inquiry and as a result Dobbyn was charged with inciting a riot. The criminal prosecution against Dobbyn began June 1985. His lawyer successfully defended him and he was acquitted on the charge of "behaving in a manner likely to cause violence against person or property and using insulting language".

In 2005, Dobbyn performed the lead single from Available Light, "Welcome Home" at the New Zealand Music Awards awards ceremony. During the performance, Ahmed Zaoui, who was appealing a security certificate issued due to alleged links to terrorist groups, appeared on stage with Dobbyn.

Awards and Accolades

At the 2001 New Zealand Music Awards Dobbyn won a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2005 and 2006 he won "Songwriter Of The Year" and "Best Male Solo Artist" respectively, both for his work on Available Light..

Ten songs written by Dave Dobbyn appeared in New Zealand's Top 100 songs (the Nature's Best series) as voted by APRA members. These were:

3: Dave Dobbyn - "Loyal"
7: Dave Dobbyn with Herbs - "Slice of Heaven"
12: DD Smash - "Whaling"
27: Th' Dudes - "Be Mine Tonight"
29: Dave Dobbyn - "Beside You"
31: DD Smash - "Outlook For Thursday"
35: Dave Dobyyn - "Language"
50: Th' Dudes - "Bliss"
70: Dave Dobbyn - "You Oughta Be In Love"
100: Dave Dobbyn - "Naked Flame"

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article Dave Dobbyn; it is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the CC-BY-SA.

Original Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave Dobbyn