(2020 Unreleased) Joe Rallos musician known as JJ

Joe Rallos who performs under the name 'JJ' is one of those 'musos' you meet around Brisbane, where a warm and welcoming vibe reflects through his playing.

Some songs you might hear him covering if you can catch one of his gigs one day, or check out a video on his Instagram or Facebook @jjmusicaus are Eagle Rock, Only Fools and Horses Opening/Closing Themes and I'm A Believer. These, he nails with his confident and light hearted demeanour in his own solo act with acoustic or electric guitar or sometimes switching to a ukulele, and along with either of these, a harmonica or a kazoo.

Now the age of thirty, Joe has played guitar since he was around eighteen years old and frequently has played gigs around Brisbane. He can sometimes be caught playing a show at an open mic night in Tiger Eye Bar on Monday nights, Bulimba Golf Club and at West End's Mad Burger on Friday and Saturday jam nights.

Working on His Debut EP

Although Joe does not have any official recordings he is currently working on his debut EP called Down in the Sewer aiming to have it released this year in 2021. This will be the release of his originally written songs.

In response to my question, if there's a specific message or idea he attempts to put forth in his music, he responds intelligently and with integrity, "I don't think about this too often actually. I love humour and have never been very good at writing love songs so I try and write about weird or unusual subjects, for instance a particular movie."

To paraphrase, he says he cares about what people think of his music but particularly likes writing for the purpose to entertain. With one of his original songs he has accessible playing over a home-made, but still quite competent music video on YouTube, you can relate these reasons to writing with his quirky, witty lyrics, and fun chilled out performance, "some folks'll swear to sport, or women plentifully, and even earl grey tea, all I need is my PC". This video he tells me, he created for fun which is about needing nothing else but your PC in life.

Musical Influences

When questioning Joe about what his influences are he gave me a list of over twenty, which one can see, with various interests and influence, you can greatly inform and develop your own original style out of. Artists I can see similarities to and who he has gained inspiration from is by looking at a few names he gave me, like the Rolling Stones, Cream, Ed Kuepper, David Allen Coe, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin and Bob Dylan.

Joe says his musical interest began with The Beatles and Bob Dylan and with both of these artists, you can see similarities that formed in Joes music like with The Beatles; various genres of blues, rock 'n' roll; and with Bob Dylan, his folk rock, telling long stories playing guitar and sometimes accompanying a harmonica.

Experience the Performance

If you catch Joe preforming around, you'll experience a musician who can become absorbed into his element, at one with his musical passion and with a strong sense of character projected through his act. You can follow updates on his music through his Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/jjmusicaus/.