For the first time in 13 years, Mike Brady will perform the song at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Brady performed the song when Collingwood met Carlton in the 1979 grand final, after arriving in Australia from England in the 1950s.
“I always felt a bit of an outsider but that day in 1979 when I sang at the grand final with the rough old PA … I finally felt that I belonged; the warmth of the crowd,” he said at the announcement at AFL House on Tuesday.
“Other times that I’ve done it, it’s still the same,” he said.
It’s one of the great opportunities you get as a performer, to be privileged enough to actually stand alongside athletes on their day, he said.
“I’m just hoping I don’t have my Meat Loaf moment, that’s all.”
Brady will also perform One Day In September on Saturday, when Hawthorn take on Fremantle in front of about 100,000 people.
Public reaction on Twitter has been overwhelmingly positive to news Brady will be back.
“@HarfTimeSEN used to put the up there cazaly cd on and take speckies on my bed #legend,” Az Kirkby tweeted.
Another tweeter, Mike Dolbey, also chimed in: “@Corpse_in_Pads Mike Brady. `Up There Cazaly’. I miss it. Should be a lifetime gig for him.”
Up There Cazaly was a hit for The Two Man Band – Brady and Peter Sullivan – in 1979. The song’s name came from a catchphrase about the early 20th-century St Kilda and South Melbourne great Roy Cazaly.
Rock groups Birds of Tokyo and Hunters & Collectors will also feature in the grand final entertainment line-up.
