Guest post by Nathan Arizona
The story behind “Friday on My Mind” is an immigrant success story. In 1964, four young guys in Australia met at Sydney’s Villawood Migrant Hostel, where recent immigrants could live while getting acclimated. Two of their families came from the Netherlands, two from England and one from Scotland. They decided to form a band called the Easybeats. Almost before they knew it Australia was in the grip of Easyfever. Like Beatlemania, but another hemisphere.
Two years later they took their talents to the home of actual Beatlemania. But in England the hits didn’t come at first. Record companies thought their songs weren’t quite good enough. Then they hooked up with producer Shel Talmy, who had helped boost the careers of the Kinks and the Who. There was one song he really liked called “Friday on My Mind.” Soon the zippy hook-filled tune was No. 1 in Britain and back home as well. It reached No. 16 in the U.S.
The song is about working-class blokes looking forward to some weekend excitement. “Tonight… I spend my bread/Tonight..I lose my head.” It’s widely considered one of the best of the mid-‘60s British Invasion, which is not what they call it over there. It might be in the running for best song ever of its kind. (Opinions may vary.)
A critic at the AllMusic website wrote that it “embodied all of the fierce kinetic energy of their Australian hits but was written at a new level of sophistication, with an amazing number of musical ‘events’ taking place in its three minutes.” Another called the song “tight as a coiled spring.”
The Easybeats sold more records after “Friday,” but nothing came close to matching that one. They went back home in 1969 and broke up later that year. Two members, Harry Vander and George Young, became a respected songwriting team. They also produced six albums by the Aussie group AC/DC. AC/DC’s Angus and Malcolm Young were George Young’s little brothers.
Vander and Young also made some well-regarded new wave albums in the late ’70s and early ’80s as Flash and the Pan. Easybeats lead singer Stevie Wright became Jesus, but it was the one in “Jesus Christ Superstar.” A single he recorded in 1974 did pretty well, but a drug problem and poor health worked against revival of his early success.
All in all, the Easybeats had a fairly lengthy and respectable career with one truly great song, which is one more than most bands ever have.
Here are the Easybeats on a French TV show in 1967. I’m not sure anybody’s ever had more fun singing a song than Stevie Wright does here. Around 1:15 he does something crazy with his legs. Toward the end he even does a bit of stage business with a pole that stands unaccountably in the middle of the set.
Richard Thompson was a big fan. He included the song on his 2003 album “1000 Years of Popular Music.”
David Bowie brought his own spin to it on his “Pin Ups” album in 1973. Peter Frampton seems to tag along just to enjoy the chaos in the street. He did his own version in 1981.
Phil Spector couldn’t get a hit out of “River Deep, Mountain High” with Ike and Tina Turner singing it. Maybe he should have given it to the Easybeats.
