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Criston Barker is a thirty five year veteran of the Australian and International music scene. His first band TRAIN was formed in 1968. His second band "ASH" was formed in 1969, the second incarnation included "Little River Band" drummer and founding member "Derek Pellicci. Together they recorded two singles, "Avignon" a top 10 Hit penned by Criston and "Midnight Witch" which was penned by Doug Ford, from the "Masters Apprentices," (recently inducted into Australia's ,"Rock and Roll Hall of Fame".
During the early 70's he toured with numerous well known bands including ex LOTUS members Warick Wilks and Kim Dawson, regulars on the "Whisky a Go Go, Chequers" circuit. Both he and Derek were headhunted by Leith Corbett forming the very popular ISLAND before moving to Melbourne in 1972 where they performed regularly, the highlight being a performance at the legendary Sunbury music festival. In 1975 he formed "FREEWAY", resulting in the very popular "Riding High" album, co-writing all ten tracks. He then joined Alternative cult band SIDEWINDER and then toured with The new HUSH.In 1979 Criston joined Russell Hitchcock and Graham Russell in "AIR SUPPLY" touring extensively for twelve months prior to recording the multi platinum internationally acclaimed Grammy nominated album, "LOST IN LOVE" which realised 5 top ten singles in the American charts in the first twelve months of release. He then formed "APOLLO BAY" touring with international acts like Elton John and Joan Armatrading. Wanting to spend more time recording he set about designing a purpose built state of the art recording studio in Melbourne known as "Powerplant" with his brother Adrian. Many of Australia's' top recording artists recorded there including Joe Camelleri, Divinyls, Wa Wa Nee, Big Pig, Dragon and Michael Hutchence, to name just a few. The original version of Pat Benetars" massive hit, "All Fired Up", penned by Keryn Tolhurst of ex Dingoes fame was also recorded at this time by Criston at Powerplant. He then recorded his own album securing the talents of numerous top musicians including, David Herschfelder, on keyboards, (two-time, "Acadamy Award Nominee") and Steve Housden, (Ex Guitarist) "Little River Band" Criston is a music composer, a performer, a producer of video clips, has written entertainment editorial for magazines and newspapers, produced & engineered several albums, composed music for documentaries and in 1995 he produced a music/entertainment television program, "Entertainment weekly" for the Prime 7 Network in Queensland.
More recently Criston has just completed a brand new album containing 14 originals songs titled "7th Heaven", due for release toward the end of 2007. He has also composed a five track CD for organ donor awareness titled, "When Angels Call"