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AC/DC: 25 Essential Songs

The Aussie legends’ rude and raucous best, from “Big Balls” to “Back in Black”

AC/DC

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Bulldozing rock-hard riffs, more double entendres than you can shake a stick at, and one comically snug schoolboy uniform: These are just a few of the ingredients that have made AC/DC one of the most iconic rock & roll bands of the past 45 years. Songs like “Highway to Hell” and “You Shook Me All Night Long” are classic-rock radio staples, and their 1980 LP, Back in Black, would be the bestselling album of all time if Thriller didn’t exist.

The secret to their success has always been their authenticity. When they exploded out of Sydney in the mid-Seventies, AC/DC’s scrappy original frontman Bon Scott sang about the group’s personal holy trinity — sex, drinking, and rock & roll — and ever since gravelly voiced Brian Johnson took the reins after Scott’s death, they’ve kept right on worshipping at the same altar. “We’ve been accused of making the same album over and over 12 times,” guitarist Angus Young once said. “The truth is, we’ve made the same album over and over 15 times.”

The best AC/DC songs overdose on crude, raucous riffs and offensive turns of phrase, whether its Scott bragging about his “Big Balls” or Young speeding down the “Highway to Hell” spewing out bluesy, high-voltage solos. As a band, they’re unrelenting and freewheeling; nobody has ever had to wonder if AC/DC were having a good time. So in recognition of Back in Blacks 40th anniversary, we look back at 25 of their greatest songs. For those about to rock, we salute you.

From Rolling Stone US

22

“Who Made Who” (1986)

Given that their lyrical concerns were usually a little earthier than dystopian visions of machines rising up to subjugate their human creators, AC/DC seemed an odd choice to write the theme song for Stephen King’s 1986 gore-camp classic Maximum Overdrive. But King — who supposedly proved his fandom to the band by serenading them with an a cappella rendition of “Ain’t No Fun Waiting Round to Be a Millionaire” — insisted that they provide the film’s soundtrack, and the band repaid the writer-director’s faith in them by penning one of their strongest songs of the Eighties. A hard-marching singalong spiked with some of Angus Young’s Van Halen–style tapping flourishes, “Who Made Who” also gave the band its first radio hit since 1983’s “Flick of the Switch.” —D.E.

23

“Thunderstruck” (1990)

In the middle of a tour supporting Blow Up Your Video in 1988, Angus Young decided to visit his wife’s parents in Holland. Afterward, he boarded a small plane to take him to a Berlin gig, and the aircraft was struck by lightning midflight. Young thought he was going to die, and when he didn’t, he decided to write “Thunderstruck.” “It started off from a little trick that I had on guitar,” Young once recalled. “I played it to Mal and he said, ‘Oh, I’ve got a good rhythm idea that will sit well in the back.’ We built the song up from that.… We came up with this thunder thing, and it seemed to have a good ring to it. AC/DC = power. That’s the basic idea.” They did several takes of the song in the studio, but mixer Mike Fraser says the one that made the cut featured Angus playing the tune’s iconic lightning-speed guitar lead in one take, the whole way through the song. It was so catchy it became a staple of the band’s concerts for years to come. —K.G.

24

“Rock the Blues Away” (2014)

The third and final single from Rock or Bust is an ode to the simple pleasures of hanging out at a bar with your buddies. “Shootin’ pool with my friends,” Johnson sings. “Smokin’ cigarettes/Tellin’ jokes out loud/Laughin’ with the crowd.” But at the time, things were far from happy-go-lucky in the world of AC/DC, with drummer Phil Rudd under house arrest in New Zealand and rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young in a nursing facility due to premature dementia. Midway through the Rock or Bust tour, singer Brian Johnson left the band due to hearing problems. For a while it looked like “Rock the Blues” might be their final single, but there are credible reports that Johnson is back and a new album is in the works. If that’s true, expect another collection of songs not all that dissimilar to “Rock the Blues Away.” The fans would expect nothing less. —A.G.

25

“Big Gun” (1993)

AC/DC’s brilliant contribution to the soundtrack for Arnold Schwarzenegger’s lackluster Last Action Hero movie was a muscular blues rocker that owed a debt to AC/DC’s early days, thanks to a boogie-woogie verse riff and a swinging Angus Young lead throughout the chorus. It was the band’s first attempt at working with producer Rick Rubin, and it went well enough that he worked with them again on 1995’s Ballbreaker. Although the Schwarzenegger film underperformed at the box office, the future Governator gave the song a boost by appearing in its video dressed like Angus and even doing the guitarist’s duck walk next to him, capping it off by telling the camera, “Now that’s what I call action.” —K.G.