Harry Vanda and George Young.

After spearheading iconic band The Easybeats, the duo turned their attention to the next wave of talent in the decades to come, churning out hit after hit throughout the Countdown era.

Among the many artists whose careers Vanda and Young helped along was John Paul Young.

The Love Is In The Air and Yesterday's Hero singer is hitting the road touring his show, the Vanda and Young Songbook – and is making a stop in Albury next month.

“It’s a little bit of heaven for me, being about to perform the songs they wrote for others as well as the ones they wrote for me,” he said.

“They are marvellous, I’ve been a fan of theirs since the mid-60s, and to be able to do some Easybeats stuff, right through to AC/DC even, is a really lovely journey through their songwriting career.” 

Young said the impact the Easybeats duo had on Australian music was profound and timeless.

Of particular note, he said, was the hidden complexity of their work.

“You only have to ask any musician who wants to play Vanda and Young music, it has that wonderful dichotomy of sounding easy, but it’s not,” he said.

“There’s all sorts of quirky changes and complexities in there.

“It’s that ability they had to mix it around and basically fool the public, it’s a great thing.” 

Though their musical talents were legendary, Young said the other pleasure of working with the songwriters was simply who they were as people.

“They had a pretty big impact,  Friday On My Mind was voted as the best Australian song ever written and it’s pretty hard to go past it,” he said.

“But personally, they were just real, normal blokes.

“They were never out flaunting the money they’d made or anything like that, they were just head down, bum up people.

“They knew there was work to be done and they did it with a smile.

“They wrote all kinds of songs, they could be beautiful or they could be political – Welcome To The Universe was quite a cynical look at the world.

“George was quite political, and Harry was the romantic.

“In the show, musically we keep the integrity of the songs there, vocally it’s pretty hard, but it all works. I think it’s come up really nicely."