Alexander Young (musician)

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Alexander Young aka George Alexander (b. December 28, 1938, Cranhill, East End, Glasgow) is a Scottish, guitarist and session musician.

Alexander Young is the brother of George, the rhythm guitarist and founding member of The Easybeats and also Malcolm and Angus, founding members of the Australian hard rock band, AC/DC.

When the Young family emigrated to Sydney Australia in 1963, Peko chose to remain in Britain to pursue musical interests. In 1967, Alexander formed the London-based band Grapefruit - initially called 'The Grapefruit' - with three former members of 'Tony Rivers & The Castaways' (namely John Perry, Geoff Swettenham and Pete Swettenham). During this time Alex played bass guitar.

Alexander signed up as songwriter with Apple Music Publishing Ltd. London at 94 Baker Street, by Terry Doran (later manager of Grapefruit) managing director of Apple and friend of the Beatles, during the summer of 1967. The song writing contract was based on the strength of the song "Lullaby for a Lazy Day", liked by the Beatles and John Lennon (a tape of this song was found in John Lennon's personal belongings after he was killed in New York).

Grapefruit received some support from The Beatles and released two albums and several singles during 1968 and 1969. The group was launched by the Beatles with a press conference in 1968, on January 17th, with the first single "Dear Delilah". It went to number 21 in the UK single chart in February 1968. Paul McCartney directed a promo film (never released) for the single "Elevator". John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison attended and helped in their recording sessions for the singles, because they didn’t have a producer or a record deal at the time. However, the group broke up in late 1969, with only Alexander remaining in the music business, as a session musician.

He released further recordings under the name of Grapefruit, Sha-Sha, and Universal Party.

During the late 1970s Alexander wrote at least one song for AC/DC. This song, titled You Ain't Got a Hold on Me was recorded during the sessions for the High Voltage album in 1975. This song was released on that album only in Austrailia until '74 Jailbreak in 1984.