Let’s Talk About AC/DC

[version sound]

I saw a picture of them playing at CBGB on Instagram and went down a bit of an AC/DC rabbit hole. When I was a kid, I had Back in Black, Dirty Deeds, and For Those About To Rock. That was right before I stumbled onto hardcore and left all other music behind for a few years. I have memories of seeing the Australian pressings of TNT, High Voltage, and Dirty Deeds in the record section of Roses, which I guess was what old people would have called a “dime store.” It was kind of like a Woolworth’s. I remember being intrigued but a broke kid who didn’t actually have the money to buy them. Seems weird as hell now that a department store would have had a record section that carried imports, then again, I also remember the supermarket having a record section in the early ‘80s, so those were definitely different times.

Anywho, tell me your AC/DC history.

[target]

It’s cool that the guy wears short pants

[SamDBL]

I remember when I was in kindergarten/early elementary, my childhood best friend had a couple of stoner/rocker parents. The mom was pretty hot, and I actually saw her naked after she got out of the shower, once. Fuckin killer! Anyway, they had posters, tapestries, albums, etc by bands like Rush and AC/DC. I remember being particularly shaken by one of the posters of ac/dc that had Angus with the devil horns and tail. I was like ‘god damn, this must be that satanic shit I keep hearing about’. I think the cover for moving pictures freaked me out, as well. I was pretty much a totally uninformed dumbass at that point. Later on I had another friend with an extremely religious family who had an older brother that the parents actually had put away in some Christian camp for fuckups because they caught him listening to metal. We snuck in his room, and he had a bunch of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest shit laying around. Again, I thought the motherfucker must’ve been alister Crowley to be listening to that stuff. It’s funny how the 80s satanic scare + limited access to music made me such a little pussy. About 5 years later Id driving around with my friends blasting morbid angel demos and gg allin cassettes on the way to some show at a practically condemned building attended by skinheads, homeless drug addicts and low level psychopaths. Hot damn.

[captain2man]

MTV.

They used to show those black & white live videos of Back in Black and For Those About to Rock and I just remember being a kid (I was probably 9 years old) thinking this is the biggest, loudest, heaviest thing imaginable (a set of goalposts which would continually move forward for another 9 years until I saw Assuck live at ABC No Rio and thought - "OK - this must be where these goalposts finally stop moving").

I'm an only child, and always got stuck going to the mall every so often with my parents....but by this point, I was old enough that they felt OK leaving me at the Sam Goody by myself for an hour with a few bucks....and shortly after seeing those videos, I bought the cassettes of High Voltage and Flick of the Switch....having no context for when these albums came out or their histories. As it turned out, I had bought their first album (kinda - the American version of High Voltage is more of a combo of their REAL first album - the Aussie version of High Voltage and their second album - the Aussie-only TNT) and most recent album (Flick of the Switch - the most overlooked album in their catalog). The singer thing was confusing to me....the guy on Flick sure sounded like the guy in those videos....but what's up with the guy on High Voltage? Is that the same guy? Is it a different guy? Did someone slip the wrong tape into the case?

I kind of miss those pre-internet days where the histories of bands was a jigsaw puzzle that you slowly began to piece together over time.

Anyway - AC/DC fan for life after that....I have all the albums and have seen them several times. They are musical comfort food.

[lewdd]

My older sister had Back in Black album that she used to listen to. And, I used to listen to some NYC FM radio station every Friday night to hear the top songs on their charts. AC/DC ran the charts for months. I think I was in 5th grade at the time.

I most recently bought a remastered copy of that Back in Black album and it sounded so much different than I remembered. It didn't sound like a wall of sound that I remembered and it seemed slower. It may be my stereo system now versus then or probably the hardcore I listened to since then slowed AC/DC down in my mind.

I have since added High Voltage, Dirty Deeds, and Highway to Hell to my vinyl record collections during the pandemic.

[scannest]

They remind me a lot of Cheap Trick. Started around the same time, had their big commercial break through at roughly similar times, had their mediocre periods at roughly the same time (late '80s). Most importantly, they work a formula that connects deeply with me, which means I can find something to love in everything that they do up to this day. None of their albums are terrible (although Fly on the Wall comes pretty close), and they haven't made a truly great one since the early '80s, but every one has 2-3 excellent songs and a lot of formula. If you dig that formula (and I do), enjoy!

[jaybird]

I remember when I was in kindergarten/early elementary, my childhood best friend had a couple of stoner/rocker parents. The mom was pretty hot, and I actually saw her naked after she got out of the shower, once. Fuckin killer! Anyway, they had posters, tapestries, albums, etc by bands like Rush and AC/DC. I remember being particularly shaken by one of the posters of ac/dc that had Angus with the devil horns and tail. I was like ‘god damn, this must be that satanic shit I keep hearing about’. I think the cover for moving pictures freaked me out, as well. I was pretty much a totally uninformed dumbass at that point. Later on I had another friend with an extremely religious family who had an older brother that the parents actually had put away in some Christian camp for fuckups because they caught him listening to metal. We snuck in his room, and he had a bunch of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest shit laying around. Again, I thought the motherfucker must’ve been alister Crowley to be listening to that stuff. It’s funny how the 80s satanic scare + limited access to music made me such a little pussy. About 5 years later Id driving around with my friends blasting morbid angel demos and gg allin cassettes on the way to some show at a practically condemned building attended by skinheads, homeless drug addicts and low level psychopaths. Hot damn.

[FormerLurker]

[version sound]

Captain2man, funny you should mention your confusion about the singers. I don’t remember even realizing that there was a different singer on Dirty Deeds. It wasn’t until years later that I realized they had two different singers.

[lewdd]

Captain2man, funny you should mention your confusion about the singers. I don’t remember even realizing that there was a different singer on Dirty Deeds. It wasn’t until years later that I realized they had two different singers.

I'm not sure when I made that discovery, but it certainly wasn't when Back in Black came out.

[Mark T.]

Being one of the few old timers still hanging out on the board, I was fortunate enough to see both Bon Scott and Brian Johnson, in mid-size venues.

September 30, 1978 – AC/DC was the opening act for Aerosmith. My first concert, just starting 9th grade, and a great double-bill for me at the time. People went ape shit crazy when Angus came out into the crowd on Bon’s shoulders. I think I got high just taking in the surrounding fumes during the show.

I was tinkering around with guitar and bass thru most of high school. At some point, a couple guys asked me to come jam with them, they played guitar and bass, but didn’t have a drummer yet. The guitar player knew like every AC/DC song. We got together only 2 or 3 time before that crapped out, but that short stint changed everything for my guitar playing, I too had to learn every AC/DC song. I couldn’t learn them fast enough. Although Angus got all the attention, I was hooked, and have been ever since, on Malcolm’s rhythm machine magic.

When Bon Scott died. 1980, I thought for sure it was over. Now what? FUCK. It didn’t seem that long after, just a handful of months and the local AOR radio station said on its release date, it would be playing the new AC/DC album, in it’s entirety, at Midnight. Holy Shit and Who the hell is Brian Johnson? In my room, I was glued to the radio and had a backup radio ready just in case. What was going to happen? Was this going to be total shit? It couldn’t be any good right? Boy was I wrong. At midnight - Back in Black delivered from beginning to end. I couldn’t get my hands on my vinyl copy fast enough. Not sure what happened, but somehow that tour eluded me.

I never really compared Brian to Bon. They were indeed very different, but for some reason it didn’t matter, it just worked.

November 4, 1983 – Fastway was the opening act for AC/DC. I reached out to a friend to have his Dad snag me up some prime seats for this one. Center stage, right at eye level. Perfect. Fastway was the perfect opening act and then the AC/DC cannons where uncovered. Yep, this was the For Those About to Rock tour. Although they didn’t have any cannon balls loaded, when those things went off inside the mid-size arena it was earth shattering and force of air actually felt like your were being hit with a cannon ball. What an awesome show, and my last time I saw them live.

Still a fan today. The albums since then have been hit and miss for me, but there’s always a few good tunes to get you rockin.

Not sure how the whole Axl thing came about and I don’t care to know. All I know is that it still makes me want to throw up.

[jaybird]

The last live band I saw before the lockdown last year was an AC/DC tribute band The Bon/Johnson's:

[AssWreckersInc]

AC/DC was the third hard rocking band I discovered, and stuck with me even when I started to get into punk rock (which I initially hated for being all fashion focused).

My mom used to play the first Doors album all the time on 8 track so that was my first exposure to dark or heavy music.

My older sister was constantly playing Queen which I got into singing along with.

Then when I heard AC/DC I was hooked. Everything needed to be louder and harder from then on.

[patient_ot]

I have a soft spot for them but don't put them on too often. I think the early stuff and BIB are best. Not enough of a fan to have ever gone further than that.

[earthdog70]

I don't know what I laughed harder at just now, the story about Sam seeing the hot Mom come out of the shower or the video of The Bon Johnson's Not that they are bad and kudos for playing "Flick of The Switch" but is the frontman also in a Meatloaf tribute band?

My first recollection of the band was getting tapes of the Australian versions of "High Voltage" and "TNT" somewhere in suburban Maryland. Playing them over and over. Then seeing "Let There Be Rock" movie in the early 80's and being blown away. I have a fair amount of their stuff and dig the Brian era just as much but I don't have everything. "Fly On The Wall" may not be great- but "Sink The Pink" is a good song

I also liked "Who Made Who" (had it on tape too) cos it had instrumentals and was featured in that awful movie with Mick Jagger-Maximum Overdrive

[jaybird]

I don't know what I laughed harder at just now, the story about Sam seeing the hot Mom come out of the shower or the video of The Bon Johnson's Not that they are bad and kudos for playing "Flick of The Switch" but is the frontman also in a Meatloaf tribute band?

My first recollection of the band was getting tapes of the Australian versions of "High Voltage" and "TNT" somewhere in suburban Maryland. Playing them over and over. Then seeing "Let There Be Rock" movie in the early 80's and being blown away. I have a fair amount of their stuff and dig the Brian era just as much but I don't have everything. "Fly On The Wall" may not be great- but "Sink The Pink" is a good song

I also liked "Who Made Who" (had it on tape too) cos it had instrumentals and was featured inthat awful movie with Mick Jagger-Maximum Overdrive :bag:

Mick Jagger wasn't in Maximum Overdrive... you're thinking of the terrible sci-fi movie he made around the same time with Emilio Estevez about a time-traveling race-car driver called Freejack.... Maximum Overdrive was the Stephen King movie also with Emilio Estevez about how all the machines and vehicles rise up and start killing people at a truck stop, which I actually enjoy as a fun, dumb, summer B-movie.

I do agree the song is pretty great though.

[earthdog70]

Oops-got my 80's flicks mixed up-thanks Jaybird! Too much Emilio

[xxxHunterxxx]

I saw Axl Rose fronting AC/DC. I’ve never really cared for the guy but he was actually really good. And Malcolm Young’s guitar playing is iconic.

[xxxMidgexxx]

As a young kid drinking too much beer and hanging out with the Sabbath burnouts, I bought and worshipped at the ground of everything up to and including "Back in Black". Then heavy metal started to happen and AC/DC never progressed.

[Mark T.]

I also liked "Who Made Who" (had it on tape too) cos it had instrumentals . . .

Yes, great album. I also had it in constant rotation in my cars cassette player.

[Mark T.]

They remind me a lot of Cheap Trick. Started around the same time, had their big commercial break through at roughly similar times, had their mediocre periods at roughly the same time (late '80s).

April 29, 1980 - Saw Off Broadway open for Cheap Trick. Front row, standing right in front of Rick Nielsen. He was posing for pictures for my friend. Pretty sure I posted some of those here in years past. Dream Police tour. Incredible. Rick kept tossing picks out, I tried desperately to snag one, but no luck. At the end of the show, I saw one on the floor behind the stage barrier. I hopped over the barrier and swiped it up. I later gave it to my cousin for her birthday, she was a huge Cheap Trick fan. 41 years later and I still regret giving that damn pick up.

[scannest]

If you're within 20 feet of Rick at a Cheap Trick show, you'd have to try hard to NOT go home with a pick or three. They are still a consistently great live band.
I've only seen AC/DC once - May 2001 at the Garden. I was thoroughly impressed that they opened with their biggest hit (YSMANL) and followed it with the title track from their then latest record. Great show.

[FormerLurker]

I think AC/DC is boring af.

[jaybird]

Randie Rebuke and The Reproachments

[SamDBL]

I have had so many run ins with cheap trick dudes as I used to go see them every time they played near here in the 90s. One time my friend brought weed for them to try and get on their good side, or whatever. We ran into Rick neilsen, who was probably high on cocaine at the time. He took the weed and said he doesn’t do it but his singer does. My friend asked for some of his picks in return. Rick said ‘I’ll make sure to throw some your way’ as he jetted off into the distance. Not really what my friend hoped for. Well, we were front row (tiny club). He just randomly threw them out as he always does. Anytime one went out, legions of people would just dive for them as if they were made out of fucking pure gold. So, after the show we are standing behind the club around an suv that the band was now in ready to go to their hotel. We were part of a crowd trying to get their shit signed. As the band took records to sign and chatted with fans, my friend stood there with a disdainful look, shaking his head in disapproval. Rick said ‘what’s your problem’. Friend said ‘you didn’t throw any picks at me’. So Rick says ‘Jesus’, pulls out a plastic baggie full of them, says ‘here you go asshole’ and throws them in the dirt and then the suv floors it. At the same time, you hear someone yell ‘holy shit!’ And the entire crowd fucking dives Into the dirt to get this treasure. What was just a second ago a bunch of record store nerds is now a frothing, fairly violent pig pile covered in dirt and muck. I’d hear random shit like ‘get off me motherfucker!’ And ‘fuck you!’ Coming out of the chaos. The bag ripped open at some point and shit went flying everywhere which led to even more insanity. At some point we kicked through enough doughy nerds and managed to get a couple of picks.
The night started when we ran into Tom Peterson, who was overly friendly and claimed his girlfriend was a huge down by law fan. Stupidly, we were like ‘is she that hot one you quit the band for’. Which was an obscure reference to when he married some hot girl in the 80s and joined her horrible band, which was a total failure. He just said ‘no....’. Anyway, super nice and actually wouldn’t stop talking. I think he was fucking with us, as well as totally high on cocaine. One of his custom hammer basses got stolen that night. By some guy that just casually walked on stage during load out and walked out the front door with it. He did it with such confidence that everyone assumed he was a roadie, or something. Lol.

[jaybird]

[FormerLurker]

God damn LOL

[jaybird]

I would love to read a book of nothing but Sam tour/groupie stories.

[FormerLurker]

I would love to read a book of nothing but Sam tour/groupie stories.

Yes, but only if he writes it.

"doughy nerds"

[JGJR]

I have a soft spot for them but don't put them on too often. I think the early stuff and BIB are best. Not enough of a fan to have ever gone further than that.

Pretty much this. When I do, it's usually Dirty Deeds or Back in Black, which are the only 2 I currently own. I should really get a copy of Highway to Hell again at some point.

[JGJR]

I have memories of seeing the Australian pressings of TNT, High Voltage, and Dirty Deeds in the record section of Roses, which I guess was what old people would have called a “dime store.” It was kind of like a Woolworth’s. I remember being intrigued but a broke kid who didn’t actually have the money to buy them. Seems weird as hell now that a department store would have had a record section that carried imports, then again, I also remember the supermarket having a record section in the early ‘80s, so those were definitely different times.

I think a lot of imports and cut-outs ended up in those kinds of places back then and earlier. I think you caught the tail end of that era in the early '80s because I remember reading about Thurston Moore (to tie this together with the SY thread) talking about picking up a copy of CAN's Ege Bamyasi in one of those places for some super low price as a cut-out. thus, I could see how some of those Aussie import copies could've ended up there, but I'm just speculating.

[drew]

I love AC/DC and have since I'm 10 yrs. old. thats 40 f'n years......shit. I've seen them four times. '87,'2001,'2009(??) two nights at MSG. The STIFF UPPER LIP tour...


Always great, every album has a few good tunes and a great reason to tour. I think now this has to be it. If they come around I'll go.

[xxxMidgexxx]

I love AC/DC and have since I'm 10 yrs. old. thats 40 f'n years......shit. I've seen them four times. '87,'2001,'2009(??) two nights at MSG. The STIFF UPPER LIP tour...


Always great, every album has a few good tunes and a great reason to tour. I think now this has to be it. If they come around I'll go.

It’s a known fact around the interwebs that you hate rock and roll. So I doubt anything you’re saying is the truth. I had to lend you a few punk albums so you’d at least know something on this board. Thank me later.

[captain2man]

If you're within 20 feet of Rick at a Cheap Trick show, you'd have to try hard to NOT go home with a pick or three. They are still a consistently great live band.
I've only seen AC/DC once - May 2001 at the Garden. I was thoroughly impressed that they opened with their biggest hit (YSMANL) and followed it with the title track from their then latest record. Great show.

My best live concert story is of a Cheap Trick show on Long Island in the late '90s or early '00s where due to a massive promotional fuck-up of epic proportions - I saw them in a big club in front of maybe 15 people. We all walked out of there with sackfuls of guitar picks.

[pedro]

When I was in 5th or 6th grade, AC/DC was one of my favorite bands. When I discovered punk, to prove my commitment, I decided I needed to hate them. I remember I scrawled "AC/DC Sucks" on one of my school binders. The hate didn't last very long. I mean they are/were fairly awesome at what they do/did. I have never seen them and I am afraid to go now. I can't imagine I wouldn't be disappointed.

AC/DC and Metallica pretty much ruled the tape deck in the Swiz van.