of the day". After writing many hits for other people, in October 1965 Murray had a hit single as a performer, with his humorous composition, "Down Came the Rain", issued on Fontana Records under the moniker Mister Murray, with "Whatever Happened to Music" on the B-side. It missed the Record Retailer Top 50, but reached number 30 in the NME chart. An Italian version of "Down Came the Rain", under the name "Una ragazza per due" ("A girl for two") and with totally rewritten lyrics (unrelated to the original ones), has been performed by various artists, among them I Giganti, Ornella Vanoni and Mina. Murray also wrote "My Brother" which became a children's favourite when recorded by Terry Scott. Later, Murray and Callander formed their own record label, Bus Stop, through which they launched the career of Paper Lace. Their first two singles, released in 1974, were both written by Murray and Callander: "Billy Don't Be a Hero" (number one in the UK, with a cover version by Bo Donaldson and The Heywoods reaching number one in the US), and "The Night Chicago Died" (number one in the US). Another song Murray was involved in was "Sing Me", a UK Top Ten hit for one-hit wonders, The Brothers, in 1977. In 1968, Murray became the youngest ever director of PRS for Music. In 1971, he conceived and founded the Society Of Distinguished Songwriters (SODS). Current members include Sir Tim Rice, Guy Chambers, Gary Barlow, David Arnold, Mike Batt, Justin Hayward, Don Black, Marty Wilde, Ricky Wilde, and more than thirty others. Bill Martin, who was also a founding member, died in April 2020. Murray was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2019 Birthday Honours for services to music. Comedy In the mid-1980s, just before the privatisation of British Telecom, Murray wrote and starred in a series of comedy programmes, The Telefun Show, which were only available for listening via the telephone (by dialling 01–246 8070 in the UK) in a similar way to the contemporary Dial-A-Disc service, which he also presented and which attracted up to 300,000 calls per day. After "Down Came The Rain", Murray built up a reputation for comedy in many areas, including voice characterisation for movies and radio commercials, as well as for after-dinner speaking. Author and speechwriter Murray is now regarded as one of Britain's leading professional humorous speechwriters,