Billie Joe Royal

The singer Billy Joe Royal is best known for his 1965 version of the Joe South song 'Down in the Boondocks', a track which had some striking similarities to Gene Pitney's '24 Hours from Tulsa' which had been a hit during the previous year. Royal had originally recorded the song as a demo for his friend South but executives at Columbia Records heard the track and offered Royal a record deal. 'Down in the Boondocks' remains Royal's most successful single having reached number nine in Billboard's Hot 100. By the late 1970s Royal's pop career was in decline although he was still a regular Las Vegas attraction and in the UK he was popular with Northern Soul audiences. His 1978 version of 'Under the Boardwalk' was to be his last foray in the pop charts; Royal then made a remarkable comeback in the mid 1980s as a mainstream country singer. His run of success in the Country Charts began with the 1984 single 'Burn Like a Rocket' and continued for the next ten years. Later in his career Royal toured regularly with material drawn from both his pop and his country music back catalogue. Throughout his career Royal had also dabbled with acting roles, his last appearance being in the 2013 movie 'Billy the Kid' playing the character Robert Ally. The singer died in his sleep in 2015 aged 73.

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