Search - Ac/Dc :: Highway to Hell

Not the best of a great lot!!

C. Muscillo | 06/27/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Firstly may I just begin by reminding all those people who seem to take delight in trying to make out AC/DC as a bad band that without this group Guns and Roses and the rest of the spandex brigade would be nowhere. AC/DC was not a second time around 16 year old heavy metal pleaser (like so many of the second and third wave groups) but they importantly (along with others Black Sabbath. Led Zep etc) created the whole heavy metal genre. To listen to a AC/DC album from the Bon Scott era is as fresh today as it was then. Think 50s rock and roll and add in Muddy Waters with a distorted guitar and your close. It is also important to point out that unlike most of todays groups AC/DC attracted not only new metal heads but also gained the respect of hardcore bikers and the like. AC/DC bites the others only sting.....



Now onto this album. Yes it was the last of Bon Scotts albums and I believe (and I am a total champion of the group) that this album marked the beginning of a more commercial and slick type of production. The producers were changed for this album and an attempt was being made to make the band more appealing to those outside of Australia. It has to be remembered (although today difficult to imagine) that upto this point AC/DC were still very much a Australian band and appealed to the Australians more than the rest of the world. Hence this album starts to make a more smooth production which paves the way for countless other groups who have taken on this sound. What no group (maybe with the exception of Motorhead and the old 60s banns) have been able to do is create a totally new sound. Please remember in the days when the new wave metal bands were still in nappies AC/DC were creating a new sound. One which only latter became known as Heavy Metal.



The album is good but if you want to hear AC/DC at their uncommercial best try Powerage. Its real blues and thats that.



And of Bon Scott. No body and I mean nobody will ever tell me that he was not the greatest rock singer of all time. So dont even try."