Former AC/DC frontman Brian Johnson has spoken out about the coronavirus pandemic’s devastating effect on live music, saying that we took the luxury of watching our favourite artists perform live for granted prior to the global shut-down.
Speaking on Joe Walsh’s Old Fashioned Rock N’ Roll Radio Show, Johnson updated listeners with how he’s been going throughout the COVID pandemic.
“I think it’s made us realise how much we took for granted,” he said. “When you’ve gone to a gig or something and you hear somebody hit that guitar, like your good self, and just knock the snot out of it and you just get that shiver down your back.”
“Now when you hear a band start up, hearing the live music — I think that’s a big miss for everybody.”
Brian Johnson was forced to exit AC/DC during their 2016 Rock or Bust World Tour after he was told by doctors to “stop touring immediately” after suffering from medically diagnosed hearing loss over fears he might suffer permanent damage.
Upon the announcement, Johnson said he was “personally crushed by this development more than anyone could ever imagine” and called the news “the darkest day of my professional life”.
“AC/DC’s lead singer, Brian Johnson, has been advised by doctors to stop touring immediately or risk total hearing loss,” AC/DC’s statement at the time read.
Brian Johnson’s comments come following Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich claiming that the Bon Scott-fronted era of AC/DC was “the definition of rock ‘n’ roll”.
“I saw AC/DC with Bon Scott four times, opening for Black Sabbath and Rainbow and then playing their own shows in Copenhagen in 1977 and San Francisco in 1979, in my early teens,” Ulrich shared.
Scott fronted AC/DC from 1974 until his death from acute alcohol poisoning in London in February 1980 at the age of 33.
“The energy was insane: Angus strutting across the stage, all guitar solos, sweat, hair, no shirt on and Bon Scott, also shirtless, tight jeans, the coolest frontman ever. To me, the definition of rock ‘n’ roll attitude is AC/DC in those formative years.”
