My name is Jose McLaughlin. I am what you might call a respected elder of the Australian music community. In the thirty years that I have lived in Australia, I have performed in every conceivable music situation, including being a member of some of this country's top bands. I have composed music for television, radio, film and even the Theme for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. I live in Brisbane and am a lecturer in music at the Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University, as well as still being very active as a guitarist/singer/songwriter.

The roots of my musical activities will, however always be indelibly linked to my upbringing in Liverpool and in particular to the Mersey scene of the 1960s. This, in retrospect, was my 'university training' and it has stood me in good stead all my life.

I took up learning music at the age of six, influenced by a pianist mother and a guitar-playing father. Although I was born in Everton, I grew up in Orrel Park, and like everyone else I knew, my early adolescent bedtimes were spent under the blankets with a crystal radio to my ear trying to pick up Radio Luxembourg. Thus by the time I started taking formal music lessons on piano I was much more interested in learning 'Nut Rocker' by B. Bumble & the Stingers than all the Chopin that my impatient teacher was trying to force on me. Needless to say that the lessons didn't last very long, and I started down the road that was taken by so many other Liverpool musicians at the time, learning by ear.

By the time I was thirteen, in 1961, I was starting to become aware that there was something going on in Liverpool. I used to take the 544 bus to Cardinal Allen Grammar School in West Derby and would go past the Aintree Institute, where I would see posters for some group called the Beatles. My best friend lived near the Litherland Town Hall and we used to go and watch in amazement as a never ending procession of cool looking guys used to arrive in Bedford and Commer vans and unload their guitars and drums. Saturday nights were usually spent standing outside the Orrel Park Ballroom trying to catch the driving sounds of groups like the Undertakers or Faron's Flamingos (and in particular Trevor Morais' drumming). Again I would come across the name the Beatles in the window of the record store underneath the OPB, copies of their record with Tony Sheridan were proudly on display.

I didn't know the extent of the magnitude of these goings on, but I wanted IN. The only problem was I was only thirteen and didn't know anybody. However, this didn't stop me making the decision that this was what I wanted to do more than anything else.

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