AC/DC THE BIG CRUNCH

AC/DC THE BIG CRUNCH

FEATURES

Jim Farber

Here we are in one of the garden spots of the Western world— the outer reaches of Manhattan’s “Alphabet City,” a section of town zoned against anyone who doesn’t have track marks. The neighborhood does have its charms, of course (water bugs love the place), though on certain blocks you won’t find such conveniences as sidewalks, streets or buildings. Tonight AC/DC are holding a party in one of the few structures left standing, at a club called, appropriately, World’s End. Interestingly enough, over the last few days Angus Young has taken a special liking to the neighborhood. “We love it,” he announces. “We’re gonna take all our summer vacations here.” Apparently what some choose to call hell, he calls home.

The band are celebrating the completion of their video shoot here, surrounding the release of their “don’t-call-it-acomeback-album,” Fly On The Wall (their first new release in two years). Besides the long-form video, the AC/DC people are also obviously in town to hype scribes on said new LP. As you’ve no doubt heard by now, the album sounds like a horde of rabid dogs racing through a hall of razor blades—only catchier. In other words, another utter masterpiece.

AC/DC are clearly leaders in the field of noise, so the question remains, why did their last, equally nifty elpee, Flick Of The Switch, suffer the unthinkable shame of not going platinum—a big blow to a band used to moving megatonnage? “In this country it might not have done as well as Back In Black, but that was a big album,” says Angus, up at Atlantic Records a few days before the Alphabet City ordeal. “In other countries that last album was more popular than any of our other albums. We’ve got audiences all over the world.”

Which still doesn’t answer the question of why the last album didn’t do gangbusters in America, but no matter. The Aussie power-boys remain a big draw here and, more importantly, they’ve found a way to stay raw and original in a field filled with slicked-up motley clones. Eleven LPs into the game, AC/DC still celebrate everything great about metal (yes, there are some things) and shun everything about it which stinks. Ultimately they deserve your respect as well as your drug money, and below is a detailed list of reasons why:

#1

Their beat isn’t anything like the hypedup runaway riffs of cliche modern metal. In fact, AC/DC’s slower, heavier rhythms come closer to the ever-catchy plod rock of such early 70s classic bands as Humble Pie or Free. AC/DC’s songs are so strongly anchored on a steady heavy rhythm that they’re almost (gasp!) sexy. Or as Angus Young puts it, their songs “have to swing. When we write songs the first thing is the feel. It’s got to have that bottom edge to it and you take it from there...It’s dumb to make a song fast just for the sake of being fast.” Makes sense.

“Some people do reduce rock V roll to the level of a wrestling match.” -Angus Young

#2

Their guitar lines are fatter than Ozzy Osbourne’s hips.

“Yeah,” Angus nods. “We’re thin, but the songs are fat.”

#3

Their production style keeps those thicker, chunkier guitar lines sounding raw and ornery. There’s none of that slicked up Def Leppard sheen. THIS IS TOTAL CRUNCH. “It’s a natural thing with us,” Angus offers. “Even in the early days, we never bothered with any effects or distortion boosters or crap on that end. More and more we try and lose a microphone in the studio or nick a few of the drummer’s cymbals. That’s the sort of band we always were. We don’t go, ‘Let’s use the latest sound.’” Right on!

#4

Angus and Malcolm Young’s guitars never stoop to the rote metal sound of pigs’ testicles being twisted. In fact, their riffs ’n’ licks probably have more in common with Keith Richards’s classic lines than with Tony lommi or his descendents.

Being a magnanimous sort, Angus basically puts this down to his brother/ rhythm guitarist Malcolm. “I can churn out hundreds of riffs, but he’ll come up with one and once you hear it, you’ll go ‘shit.’ He has that classic guitar feel—like in a song like ‘Back In Black’ or ‘Fly On The Wall.’...A lot of people don’t appreciate what rhythm guitar is. They think it’s just a solo with less licks.”

#5

Brian Johnson’s voice sounds like Mercedes McCambridge on a bad day. Fact is, he doesn’t sound anything like a human being—more like a demented garbage disposal, or maybe even a guitar riff. ‘‘Sometimes I’ll hear a note on Angus’s guitar,” Brian says. ‘‘And I’ll think it’s me. Honest.”

#6

Because Brian Johnson sounds like a demented garbage disposal, you can’t make out any of the lyrics, which means you can’t make fun of ’em. ‘‘It’s an adventure,” Angus opines. ‘‘You can buy the record and wonder what the hell the guy’s going on about.”

#7

One thing you can tell from the lyrics— if only from the titles. There’s none of this son-of-art-rock/flight-of-the-lcarus crud like you’ll find in some HM bands I won’t name. (OK—Iron Maiden). Brian Johnson favors the example of the new Uli Jon Roth song/video ‘‘The Night The Master Comes.” ‘‘Have you seen that fucking thing?” he says. ‘‘I nearly wet my pants. And it’s even funnier cuz the guy who’s singing it has a lisp. He’s stuck in a fucking time warp.”

#8

Speaking of fucking time warps— AC/DC’s albums today sound pretty much the same as they did when the band started out 10 years ago. I mean this as a compliment—i.e., they don’t pander to modern audio/video whims. ‘‘That’s your style,” Angus says. ‘‘It wouldn’t be AC/DC if suddenly we did something completely different. And we’re certainly not going to start putting dragons on the album covers. We’re not magicians from the 14th century reincarnated.”

#9

AC/DC may be the only metal band in the world who don’t wear any leather. Angus: ‘‘Well, there’s my watchband.”

#10

In interviews they don’t boast about how many venereal diseases they have or how many bottles of Robitussen they can chug. ‘‘Some people do reduce rock ’n’ roll to the level of a wrestling match,” says Angus, which is no slight to Ms. Lauper, I’m sure.

#11

Their early videos were banned from many video stations. ‘‘They said you can’t have a guy with a guitar sticking through him and blood gushing out,” Angus explains. ‘‘Why not?...I remember one video we had with me blowing up. And it was done in the best possible taste.”

#12

They had a terrific criterion for hiring new drummer Simon Wright. (Phil Judd, suffering from battle fatigue, bailed out after the last LP.) Angus: ‘‘We just put an ad in the paper saying, ‘Any drummer under 5 feet 2 inches.’”

#13

They once got mistaken for a punk band. ‘‘When we started playing in Australia,” Angus explains. “They had these punk bands already. They had big hairstyles with dyed hair. But they didn’t know what to do with it. They were content to sit in the pubs and play loud music. When we started there were no bands that weren’t singing about politics or scab labor. When we first went to England in ’76 they didn’t have any of these bands. They didn’t know what the fuck they were. Towards the end of the year they started getting punk. Before that, one guy used to play our records over there. He had them sent over from Australia, and he’d say we were an Australian punk band.”

#14

All bands—punk, heavy metal or whatever—like to close things out by saying they’re ‘‘just rock ’n’ rollers...” But with AC/DC it’s really true. They’re one of the few groups who really play harddriving rock ’n’ roll outrageous enough to make me bust out laughing intentionally.

I tell Angus and Brian this up at Atlantic and they seem genuinely flattered. Beyond the music, their only idea of ‘‘rock theatrics” is to moon the audience and put Angus in a schoolboy suit. ‘‘The bottom line is we get out there and play rock ’n’ roll music,” Angus says, echoing the old refrain. ‘‘I may wear that school suit but for me that just gives me that extra bit of confidence. Then I can act like a real asshole.”