Jimmy Barnes has been there and back. He's tasted glory as the most successful Australian rock & roll singer. He's also struggled with the pressures of being a tall poppy and he's wrestled his own demons. It's been a wild ride. At age 16, Jimmy played his second gig as lead singer on the back of a truck one hot Saturday at Gawler Raceway in Adelaide, South Australia. The band would become Cold Chisel. A couple of years later they had a residency at the Larg's Pier Hotel that was so packed, fans drove a ute through the back wall to get in. By 1978 Cold Chisel was a nasty rock & soul band tearing up the pubs of Sydney and Melbourne. Living in flop houses on $100 a month, Cold Chisel didn't care a rat's for anything but rock & roll. They signed a record deal although the label had no expectations for their success. The first single, "Khe Sahn" was banned from commercial radio. But Cold Chisel had something more valuable than record company paychecks or radio jocks – Chisel had genuine fans. Chisel fans knew that when they bought a ticket at the door, all bets were off. With Jimmy Barnes out front, slugging spirits and using his voice to duel with the soaring guitar lines from Ian Moss, Chisel kicked arse like rock & roll is supposed to. Within three short years of their first album's release, Cold Chisel was the most successful band in the land. The 1980 album East, surpassed all expectations selling a quarter of a million copies straight out of the box. Every ticket on their now-legendary tours was sold out. People still talk of the Circus Animals tour where Jimmy sang on a trapeze underneath a motorcycle delicately balanced on a tight-rope! Jimmy was a star. Chisel's records were instant classics - "Khe Sahn", "Flame Trees" "Saturday Night", "Rising Sun", "Cheap Wine", "Breakfast At Sweethearts", "You Got Nothing I Want" .. most have become national anthems. In 1984 Chisel came to an end with the largest concert tour ever undertaken by an Australian band - a record that still stands over twenty years later. Within a month of Cold Chisel finishing, Jimmy Barnes was on the road with a new band, and within a year of that Jimmy released his first solo album, Bodyswerve, and it entered the charts at #1. The next year he signed to Geffen Records in the US and cut 5 new tracks that became the album For the Working Class Man - another #1 debut. The title track was used by Ron Howard for his film Gung Ho. Artistic differences ended Jimmy's relationship with Geffen and he recorded 1987's Freight Train Heart - another #1 debut - on his own terms. The national tour in support of that album, underwritten by Pepsi, featured a young Perth guitarist Mark Lizotte (aka Diesel) who would soon become Jimmy's closest musical collaborator. Around this time, Jimmy also teamed up with INXS and the Divinyls, the Models, the Saints and the Triffids for the massive national tour, Australian Made. To celebrate Australian Made, Jimmy and INXS recorded an Easybeats song "Good Times." The single topped the Australian charts and was included on the soundtrack to the film The Lost Boys and subsequently was a Top 40 hit in the US and a Top 10 hit in the UK. Jimmy began working with American producer Don Gehman on the album Two Fires. Released in 1990 and yet another #1 album, it was Jimmy's most sophisticated set yet. His songwriting had matured and he had learned how to control the power in his voice. On little more than a whim, Jimmy and Don Gehman cut an album of soul classics that Jimmy particularly liked. The Soul Deep album was a massive success with sales to date close to a million copies. Jimmy's next album, Heat, was his toughest yet. Straight up hard rock and some of his best songs ever. The album was also a success, despite being swamped in the grunge craze that broke that summer of 1993. That same year however Jimmy put together the Flesh and Wood project that featured duets and collaborations with a number of artists. The emphasis was on acoustic renditions of songs and letting the voices speak for themselves. For twenty straight years, Jimmy Barnes had been going full bore - writing, recording, touring - without a break. In the meantime he and wife Jane had also raised a family of three daughters and one son. People stopped him in the street everywhere he went. Jimmy was involved in a number of major charities - mostly related to youth issues. After twenty years it was time to take stock. Jimmy sold his house and cleared the decks. There are only so many times that you can tour Australia. Jimmy needed to reassess and recharge. He moved to France and toured through Europe and the UK. He made the Psyclone album which was largely under-valued in the changing record company structures. After three years in Europe, Jimmy came back ready to rebuild his career. He continued to tour and to record and wrote with a number of different people. His growing musical family and his natural curiosity led him to explore different kinds of music, especially in the soul vein. Jimmy also took part in the reformation of Cold Chisel. Despite all the disagreements and the feuds, there was still a deep friendship between the five members. Getting together wasn't just a matter of recording some tunes and playing some shows - it was also a reconciliation. He then recorded an album Love and Fear which purged a lot of demons that had been plaguing him for many years. He confronted issues that he had avoided by being on tour and by drinking and taking drugs. He cut another album of southern music, Soul Deeper, that had a bluesier feel than its predecessor. In 2004, Jimmy started assembling the duets he had recorded over the years. He was also itching to put some new songs out and so the idea of Double Happiness began. Out in the Blue was Jimmy Barnes' 13th studio album, following the multi-platinum album Double Happiness which put Jimmy back at the #1 spot on the ARIA charts. The 12 new songs were recorded with producer Nash Chambers (Kasey Chambers, Troy Cassar-Daley. Jimmy latest release is The Rhythm And The Blues - the prequel to Soul Deep and Soul Deeper! This is a complete portrait of a multi-faceted artist. And just in case you thought Barnes might consider slowing down, you're wrong – he's actually just speeding up. There's another rock album in the wings and one with a twist. After more than two decades apart, Barnes has reunited with American songwriter and former Journey band member Jonathan Cain and written a few songs for an album Barnes expects to be released some time next year. Cain collaborated with Barnes in his early solo years in the classic album For The Working Class Man.