A TRIBUTE TO COCO LEE.

Australian radio presenter Mike Hammond described the reaction to her 2000 song “Do You Want My Love?” as “Cocolossal,” a play on her name and a fitting description of the angelic voiced Hong Kong-born and Hong Kong and US-raised Ferren (Coco) Lee. The cowboy hat wearing Australian music presenter Ian “Molly” Meldrum, would have said to “do yourself a favour,” and buy her album, and I remember him interviewing her as she sat, scantily clad, opposite him and my mother saying, “That girl would have nothing to fear from Molly. As, sure enough, Molly revealed that the turning point in his life was when he yelled out about his love for The Beatles and he then was open about his homosexuality.

Coco Lee was radical in that when she emerged, her belly button was revealed and photographed almost as often as Shania Twain’s yet she was eager to burst onto the more conservative Asian music scene, and burst onto it she did.

Having had a special interest in Asian cultures since I was 12, I also took an interest in the music and purchased her first English CD.

I could scarcely believe it, especially after Coco denied there was any trouble between herself and her millionaire husband, Bruce Philip Rockowitz, when I saw that Coco Lee was dead when I read the news yesterday. I was saddened to think that she was in such emotional pain that she would attempt to take her own life and ultimately die so young.

Coco Lee 17/1/1975–5/7/2023. Soar high, Angel Coco. In our hearts you will stay.