726: VIGIL | THE EASYBEATS

Vigil is the fifth studio album by Australian rock band The Easybeats, released in May 1968. This would be the second and final album by the band released on the United Artists Records label.

Scrapped 2nd album for United Artist Records

During mid 1967 the band were working on the follow-up to their Good Friday album with producer Glyn Johns at Olympic Recording Studios. According to John Tait's book Vanda & Young: Inside Australia's Hit factory, the album was to be titled Good Times. However, due to legal issues between the band and its Australian production company Albert Productions, that album was permanently shelved. Some of the surviving tracks ("Good Times", "Land of Make Believe"), as well as newly recorded ones, would be used on what was now titled Vigil (so titled as tribute to the fans who held vigil for the album's long release). Other songs from the original Good Times album would eventually be released on The Shame Just Drained compilation in 1977.

Work continued on recordings after the band returned from their US tour in September 1967. During this period, the group worked with arrangers Bill Shepherd and Alan Tew. In late 1967, they released two singles that would later appear on the released album: "Falling Off the Edge of the World" in the US and "The Music Goes 'Round My Head"/"Come in You'll Get Pneumonia" in the UK. Their next single "Hello, How Are You" marked a change in musical direction for the group with its soft pop/adult contemporary sound. The song reached #20 in the UK Charts in March 1968. However, the band have always felt the change in sound might have hurt their standing with the public. The song's co-writer, George Young, later reflected in Rolling Stone Australia: "The people in the industry dig it and it skidded in and out of the Top 20. But it was a classic mistake from our point of view. We were a rock 'n' roll band and what was a rock band doing with this corn-ball, schmaltz shit? We shouldn't have done that".

The band returned to London and continued to work in the studio. Their next single, "The Music Goes 'Round My Head", again written by Vanda and Young, is considered to have been influenced by the emerging UK Rocksteady/Ska scene. In late 1967, Vanda and Young began writing for other artists. Two of their songs, "Bring a Little Lovin'" and "Come In, You'll Get Pneumonia", were covered by Los Bravos (and later by Ricky Martin as "Dime Que Me Quieres") and Paul Revere and The Raiders respectively. Still trying to get back into the UK charts, the band moved to a more pop-friendly sound and released the soft rock, ballad "Hello, How Are You" on 8 March 1968. The plan worked and the song reached #20 in the UK charts. However, in retrospect, the band have cited the change in sound as a mistake, stating that it alienated the band's longterm fans. Read more

From Wiki The Easybeats page: In May, the band finally released their second album for United Artists; Vigil (re-titled Falling Off The Edge Of The World in the US). The album was a mixture of recent singles, new recordings and out-takes from the scrapped 1967 album. Two of the songs recorded for the abandoned LP, "Land of Make Believe" and "Good Times", were released as singles. The baroque pop ballad "Land of Make Believe" was released in the UK on 5 July and in Australia on 18 July. Although failing to chart in the UK, it reached No. 18 on the Australian charts. The B-side to the Australian single was the next UK single; "Good Times". Released on 13 September, "Good Times" again failed to chart in the UK. An often-told story about the song is that when the track was broadcast on BBC radio, it was reputedly heard by Paul McCartney on his car radio; McCartney apparently rang the station immediately to request a repeat playing.[2] The song featured Steve Marriott of the Small Faces on backing vocals and Nicky Hopkins on piano. In November, Albert Productions released the UK B-side to "Good Times", the instrumental track "Lay Me Down and Die", as a single in Australia. The single was slammed by critics and reached #59 on the Australian chart; their lowest-charting single to date.

Through late 1968, the formerly tight-knit band began to drift apart. Drugs were a factor, but the growing independence of the Vanda and Young team as a creative unit was also a major catalyst. By this time the duo were working substantially on their own and between them they could now play almost any instrument needed for recordings and had become skilled in engineering and producing their own recordings. They wrote prolifically, but many of their songs from this period remained unreleased for many years. They were also reluctant to do more than a few gigs per month, and so the band only came together for occasional performances or for 'demo' sessions at Central Sound Studios in Denmark Street.