Noise Pollution
By Mitch Berg
There are so many entries in the “it just doesn’t seem possible” file in realizing that today is the thirtieth anniversary of the release of Back In Black by AC/DC.
BThe album – the first after the death of Bon Scott barely 17 months earlier – was a gloriously snotty blues-rock romp, the kind of thing every garage band in the world – including mine – thought they could pull off.
Of course, few garage bands had a leather-lunged shrieker like Brian Johnson, or a blues-rock machine like Angus Young or – to me, the band’s signature – a metal-shredding rhythm player like Malcolm Young to base their sound around.
Here’s the part that blew my mind; Back in Black, with 49 million copies sold, is the second biggest-selling album of all time (that’d be worldwide; it’s #5 in the US), and the biggest ever from a band.
And the ultimate “it doesn’t seem possible”?
That it was thirty years ago!
It’s hard to write much about AC/DC. I’ll just let the band do the talking.
July 25th, 2010 at 8:29 pm
Hugely surprised to see that it (apparently) outsold Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, which, if Wikipedia is to be believed, was on the top 200 charts for 741 weeks.
July 26th, 2010 at 12:13 am
PF’s Dark Side was on the top 200 forever and a day. I used to watch the charts just to see when it would ever fall off — 14+ years is quite a run.
Never got into AC/DC much, tho my brother did.
Funny thing about titles: at the time I was into “progressive rock” and conservative politics, but my brother was into “retro rock” and progressive politics. (Don’t worry, my brother’s recovered — his politics are now paleoconservative, well to my right, but he hasn’t lost his taste for AC/DC.)
July 26th, 2010 at 5:38 am
The thing I didn’t appreciate about AC/DC back in the day was this: they took their role as entertainers a lot more seriously than they took themselves. I wish more rock bands saw it that way.
July 26th, 2010 at 7:21 am
Mr. D;
Excellent point! I’m right there with ya’ on that.
It’s a vital part of my music collection.
My 22 year old son, after hearing me playing it a few years back, also plays it frequently.
July 26th, 2010 at 7:35 am
Oh, hey look: a tab for Back in Black:
http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/tabs/a/ac_dc/back_in_black_ver9_tab.htm
July 26th, 2010 at 10:25 am
Pure, unadulterated joy… hearing AC-DC in “Iron Man” and “Iron Man 2”.
July 26th, 2010 at 10:31 am
The guitar line for Back In Black is pure genius. Angus, for those about to rock, we salute you!