AC/DC released Back in Black

Back in Black AC/DC

Released: July 25, 1980 Peak: 4 US, 12 UK, 1 CN, 11 AU Sales (in millions): 25.0 US, 0.1 UK, 50.0 world (includes US and UK) Genre: hard rock/heavy metal

Tracks: (Click for codes to charts.) Hell’s Bells [5:09] (10/31/80, 3 CL, 50 AR, 7 AU, 6 DF) Shoot to Thrill [5:14] (4/11/81, 4 Cl, 60 AR, 98 UK) What Do You Do for Money Honey [3:33] (26 CL) Given the Dog a Bone [3:30] (18 CL) Let Me Put My Love into You [4:12] Back in Black [4:13] (12/13/80, 37 BB, 39 CB, 35 GR, 54 HR, 1 CL, 51 AR, 27 UK, 65 AU, 4 DF) You Shook Me All Night Long [3:28] (8/19/80, 36 BB, 42 CB, 26 GR, 42 HR, 1 CL, 38 UK, 8 AU, 3 DF) Have a Drink on Me [3:57] (8/19/80, 8 CL, 32 DF) Shake a Leg [4:03] Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution [4:12] (11/29/80, 6 CL, 15 UK, 7 AU, 14 DF) Songs written by Johnson, Young, and Young. Total Running Time: 41:31 The Players: Brian Johnson (vocals) Angus Young (guitar) Malcolm Young (rhythm guitar, backing vocals) Cliff Williams (bass) Phil Rudd (drums)

Rating: 4.679 out of 5.00 (average of 33 ratings) Quotable: One of “hard rock's greatest achievements” – Greg Prato, AllMusic.com Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

The Bon Scott Years The Young brothers Malcolm (rhythm guitar) and Angus (lead guitar) formed AC/DC in Australia in 1973. They went through a variety of personnel changes in their early years, but cemented their identity with the arrival of vocalist Ron Belford “Bon” Scott (originally the band’s chauffeur), CS in 1974. They released their first album, High Voltage, in 1975. They released five more albums in the last half of the decade, culminating with 1979’s Highway to Hell. The band appeared “poised for worldwide breakthrough success” AM since the album became their first in the United States to reach gold status. Then tragedy struck. Scott went on a drinking spree and was found dead in the back seat of a car, having choked on his own vomit. 500 The Arrival of Brian Johnson Bon Scott’s dad told the band at the funeral, “You can’t stop, you have to find someone else.” CM After two days of mourning, Malcolm called Angus and they went back to work. Five months later, the result was “this smoking album with the most prophetic title ever.” ZS It “is the ultimate example of a band turning a career-threatening negative into a remarkable positive.” AM It “is one of the greatest comeback stories in rock history.” CQ New vocalist Brian Johnson “was a perfect fit” CQ “with a voice like gravel and swagger to boot.” CQ He “was as willing to shred the upper end of his voice as Scott had been” TM and “had the same bluesy edge as Scott” AM but “sang with more power and conviction.” AM The band was able to retain “their core identity as world class hard-rock riffers” CQ even as Johnson stamped “his own personality, not to mention distinctive rasp, on the record.” VH1 He “sings as if he’s being tortured – and thoroughly enjoying it.” TL Mutt Lange Producer Mutt Lange had worked with AC/DC on their Highway to Hell album and gave the band “a meatier sound.” CS He returned behind the boards for Back in Black. Prior to AC/DC, he’d worked with acts like Graham Parker and the Boomtown Rats. His work with AC/DC, however, cemented him as one of the most successful rock producers of all time. He would later work on blockbuster albums like Foreigner 4 as well as Def Leppard’s Pyromania and Hysteria. Lange’s “penchant for sonic perfection and pop accessibility would keep the wheels moving.” CQ Lange “helped the group focus its high voltage rock,” AM crafting “a delicate balance of power and finesse that defined the commercial side of heavy music for years.” TM Meat and Potatoes Rock and Roll “It doesn’t get any simpler than this meat-and-potatoes rock and roll.” CRS Critics knocked the band for its “testosterone-laden paeans to sex, booze, and more sex and more booze,” RV but “AC/DC was never a band to bother with any niceties in their music.” CRS They charged forward with “completely straight-ahead guitar power chords, brutal beats pounded out in 4/4 time, and blistering vocals on top.” CRS The rhythm section of bassist Cliff Williams and drummer Phil Rudd “fuse traditional blues with stadium rock dramatics.” CM They get “right near the boiling point and then hang there, waiting for the schoolboy-uniform–wearing Angus Young to deliver demonically twisted lead guitar that pushes things over the edge.” TM Legacy “Coming after years of synthesized disco and overproduced AOR, Back in Black proved once again the resilience of live, loud, and melodic rock, and listeners immediately responded.” TB Author Chris Smith goes so far as to say that AC/DC “rescued heavy metal.” CS He says in 1980, “metal dinosaurs like Deep Purple and Black Sabbath were losing their touch…and newcomers like Van Halen and Ted Nugent were hard to take seriously….AC/DC…remind[ed] everybody what heavy metal was all about: alienated teenagers bobbing their heads in unison to crunchy power chords, banshee screams, and a thundering rhythm section.” CS It was one of “the greatest hard-rock album of the decade” RV and “one of rock’s all-time classics.” AM “For many, [it is] the essential hard-rock record of the modern era.” TB It “might be the purest distillation of hard rock ever;” sup>500 it “is a ten-song feast of tightly wound, enormously disciplined stomp rock” TM infused with “the relentless logic of a sledgehammer.” sup>500 ''This is the goes-to-11 playlist of men behaving badly the world over..” EW’12 Rolling Stone called it “the leanest, meanest record of all time.” CM The Songs Here are thoughts on the individual songs from the album. “Hell’s Bells” The “eerie Hells Bells” AM served as an “ominous opener.” CQ “It could be the most perfect opening to any album. For a full 20 seconds there’s nothing but the lone, eerie sonics of a giant ringing church bell. Then Malcolm Young plays an impossibly slow, circular rhythm guitar riff that is pure funeral march,” CM making for a fitting farewell to Bon Scott. “Shoot to Thrill” and “What Do You Do for Your Money Honey” That unforgettable opening is followed by “the melodic Shoot to Thrill,” AM which then moves on to What Do You Do for Money Honey. On the latter, Lange “made sure that every walloping rhythm guitar supporting Johnson’s tales of lasciviousness…weighed in at industrial strength – and was executed with surgical precision.” TM “Given the Dog a Bone” and “Let Me Put My Love into You” “Given the Dog a Bone breaks the rules of chivalry and grammar – this testosterone filled romp’s passion for bangin’ is less focused on hips than heads.” TL “Though unabashed in its misogyny – Let Me Put My Love into You would be nicer if it were a request rather than a command.” AM “Back in Black” The album includes “such perennial rock anthems as the stomping title track” AM with its “proud peacock strut.” TM “Few recorded riffs have proven catchier, with axeman Angus Young peppering blues runs between massive power chords. You couldn’t have chosen a better song to introduce Brian Johnson. In a gutsy move, the lyrics are eerily self-referential (‘I’m let loose/ From the noose/ That’s kept me hanging about’) and Johnson snarls ‘em with intent.” CQ “You Shook Me All Night Long” The “primo dance-metal banger You Shook Me All Night Long” sup>500 is “unabashedly sleazy.” CQ This song and “Hell’s Bells” “are arena anthems of uncorrupted hookiness and sonic quality,” TL not to mention “strutting blues-based guitar heat.” sup>500 The song gave the band their first top-40 hit. “Have a Drink on Me” and “Shake a Leg” “Not a single weak track is included; even the lesser-known album tracks are strong (Have a Drink on Me, Shake a Leg).” AM “Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution” AC/DC wraps up their metal masterpiece with “the album-closing battle cry Rock and Roll Ain't Noise Pollution,” AM an “epic…that says it all: ‘We’re just talkin’ about the future / Forget about the past / It’ll always be with us / It’s never gonna die, never gonna die.’” CM

Resources and Related Links: AM AllMusic.com review by Greg Prato CQ Consequence.net (9/12/2022). “The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time” CM Toby Creswell & Craig Mathieson (2012). 100 Best Albums of All Time. Hardie Grant Books. Page 236. EW’12 Entertainment Weekly (9/27/2012). “Top 100 Albums” TM Tom Moon (2008). 1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die. Workman Publishing Company, Inc.: New York, NY. CRS Tim Morse (1998). Classic Rock Stories: The Stories Behind the Greatest Rock Songs of All Time. New York, NY: St. Martin's Griffin. Pages 181-195. RV The Review (Oct./Nov. 2001). “The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time” by Clarke Speicher 500 Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Albums of All Time CS Chris Smith (2009). 101 Albums That Changed Popular Music. Oxford University Press. Pages 155-7. TB Thunder Bay (2005). Albums: The Stories Behind 50 Years of Great Recordings. Thunder Bay Press; San Diego, CA. Pages 202-3. TL Time Magazine (11/13/2006). “All-TIME 100 Albums” by Josh Tyrangiel and Alan Light VH1 VH1 (2003). 100 Greatest Albums. Edited by Jacob Hoye. Pocket Books: New York, NY. ZS Zagat Survey (2003). Music Guide: 1,000 Top Albums of All Time. Coordinator: Pat Blashill. Music Editor: Holly George-Warren. Editors: Betsy Andrews and Randi Gollin. Zagat Survey, LLC: New York, NY. Page 32. Other Related DMDB Pages: First posted 7/22/2012; last updated 8/7/2024.

Billy Joel “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me” hit #1

It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me Billy Joel

Writer(s): Billy Joel (see lyrics here) First Charted: May 13, 1980 Peak: 12 US, 13 CB 14 HR, 14 RR, 45 AC, 1 CL, 14 UK, 13 CN, 10 AU, 1 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.) Sales (in millions): 2.0 US, -- UK, 2.21 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 32.0 video, -- streaming

Awards: Click on award for more details.

About the Song: Billy Joel launched his solo career with 1971’s Cold Spring Harbor and found top-ten success with “Just the Way You Are” (1977), “My Life” (1978), and “You May Be Right” (1980). However, he was still that “critics still lumped him in with the middle-of-the-road-soft-rock balladeers of the era.” SG He “saw the kind of press that punk and new wave bands were getting, and he decided that there wasn’t actually anything new about these new bands.” SG For his 1980 Glass Houses album, he aspired “to show that he could rock as hard as anyone else.” SG While Joel intended to “throw a rock at the image people had” FB of him, he didn’t win everyone over. Rolling Stone critic Dave Marsh said, “Glass Houses is Joel’s attempt to establish once and for all that he is a rocker to the core, which is a nearly disastrous error, not so much because he can’t rock as because he is better at several other things.” FB The album’s first single, “You May Be Right,” was “basically an Elvis Costello/Joe Jackson new-wave rave-up.” SG The follow-up single, “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me,” “is a sharp, well-written song” SG that “works in the same mode…but with some angry snark in the mix, as well.” SG His first #1 found him “sarcastically raging against the idea that he should have to switch his style up, to adapt to a new sound…even as he… [does] exactly what he complains that he shouldn’t have to do.” SG Interestingly, even Marsh acknowledged that the song “redeemed the project commercially.” FB Musically, it “is more mannered than ‘You May Be Right.’…It’s a controlled and locked-in rockabilly shuffle – as if Joel is proving how old these new sounds are by making them sound as old as possible.” SG “At times, it nods in the direction of Bruce Springsteen, Joel’s fellow tri-state beach-town road warrior; Richie Cannata’s saxophone solo is a straight-up Clarence Clemons bite. But Joel never tries to wail his way into transcendence, the way Springsteen always did. Joel is more concerned with airing out petty grievances.” SG Resources: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Billy Joel FB Fred Bronson (2003). The Billboard Book of Number One Hits (5th edition). Billboard Books: New York, NY. Page 527. SG Stereogum (3/30/2020). “The Number Ones” by Tom Breihan WK Wikipedia Related Links: First posted 6/30/2022; last updated 10/28/2022.

Joy Division released Closer

First posted 1/26/2013; updated 9/13/2020.

Closer Joy Division

Released: July 18, 1980 Peak: -- US, 6 UK, -- CN, 23 AU Sales (in millions): -- US, -- UK, 0.25 world (includes US and UK) Genre: goth rock

Tracks: Song Title (Writers) [time] (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts. Atrocity Exhibition Isolation Passover Colony A Means to an End Heart and Soul Twenty Four Hours The Eternal Decades Total Running Time: 44:16 The Players: Ian Curtis (vocals, guitar) Bernard Sumner (guitar, bass) Peter Hook (bass, guitar) Stephen Morris (drums, percussion)

Rating: 4.686 out of 5.00 (average of 20 ratings) Quotable: -- Awards:

About the Album: “Rock, however defined, rarely seems and sounds so important, so vital, and so impossible to resist or ignore as here.” AMG Closer is “lauded as a gothic masterpiece” PP because of “its impact on the subsequent goth movement – a paradigm shift for punk music.” ZS Author Colin Larkins says it is “deservedly regarded by many critics as the most brilliant rock album of the 80s.” WK It introduces “a new post-punk sound, which oscillated between unsettling beats to, even more surprisingly, mutated disco sound in the space of a few tracks.” GQ It “burns with distress and foreboding, the songs seeming to drag us deeper into the depths of Curtis’ despairing mind, as we bear witness to his tortured words.” PT It is “a colossal work of art; a post-punk pillar; an ingenious sonic landscape; a blinding existential vision of songwriting.” PT The album “journeys through a bleak songscape of hopelessness and loss,” RV a fact which caused the album to be more scrutinized the wake of lead singer Ian Curtis’ suicide. As such, the album “is pervaded by a sense of eerie beauty, like the still before the storm.” PR Curtis’ vocals “haunt the stark, minimalist backdrop like a troubled earth-bound spirit, pleading for release.” PR “The tracks would be in danger of grinding to a complete standstill, enthralled by their own spectral grandeur” PR if not for “the momentum secured by [Peter] Hook’s melodic” PR and “icy bass lines” RS500 alongside the “occasional flashes of overdriven” PR and “droning guitars.” RS500 What also lifts the album is that it is “dark, depressed and innovative.” ZS “Differing mixes, differing atmospheres, new twists and turns define the entirety of Closer, songs suddenly returned in chopped-up, crumpled form, ending on hiss and random notes.” AMG The end result is a “harrowing and emotionally raw testament” ZS and “one of the most chilling albums ever made.” RS500 Epilepsy and Suicide: Curtis was diagnosed with epilepsy in January 1979. “While the band and manager Rob Gretton insisted that no strobes or flashing lights were used when Joy Division performed, it’s at best doubtful whether Curtis should have been performing at all.” QT He would sometimes have seizures on stage and his condition certainly wasn’t helped by the rock-n-roll lifestyle. In addition to physical problems, Curtis was dealing with depression and a failed marriage. He’d married young at 19 years old and already had a daughter. However he was having an affair with Belgian journalist Annik Honoré and his wife, Deborah, wanted a divorce. On May 18, 1980, he hung himself at age 23 on the eve of the band’s first North American tour. Making of the Album/Martin Hannett: The band started recording the album on March 18, 1980 at Britannia Row in London where Pink Floyd recorded Animals and parts of The Wall. It was produced by Martin Hannett, who’d also done Unknown Pleasures. His production was “more intentionally claustrophobic and confrontational” on Closer than Unknown Pleasures. PT He “was all about creating space – a kind of musical inner space” QT so he deliberately “bathed the tracks in effects and mixed them to sound hollow and cavernous.” DG Sumner didn’t like the mix because he wanted it to sound more like the band’s aggressive live performances. Hook said hw wanted the band to sound more like the Clash. QT Hook said Hannett referred to the band as “three idiots and a genius” QT and that Hannett preferred to work alone in the studio with “the genius” (Curtis). QT The Album Cover: In the wake of Curtis’ suicide, there was some controversy over the album cover. Released only two months after his death, Closer sported a cover with mourners gathered around a man lying on a bed. The band was accused of bad taste and cashing in on Curtis’ death. However, the cover had been approved by all four members before Curtis killed himself. The photo, taken by Bernard Pierre Wolff, was taken from a trendy art magazine called Zoom. It was of a statue created in 1910 by sculptor Demetrio Paernio. Called “The Lamentation of Christ,” it depicted the Virgin Mary, St. John, and Mary Magdalene mourning the recently crucified Jesus. The statue was from the Appiani family tomb in the Staglieno cemetery in Genoa, Italy. “Atrocity Exhibition” Lead song Atrocity Exhibition “sets the tone for the album’s sound: metallic rhythms, damaged synthesizers and jagged guitars are laid bare against brutal and sparse lyrics.” RV It “was arguably the most fractured thing the band had yet recorded.” AMG Hook and Sumner actually traded instruments on the track so Sumner played bass and Hook played guitar. Meanwhile, Morris added a tribal drum pattern influenced by krautrock band Can. Morris said, “I was probably trying to do ‘A Saucerful of Secrets’ or something by Captain Beefheart. I remember making them put in synths through fuzzboxes and making a horrible ambient racket, which you could barely hear on the record, but it's like a buzz saw.” GQ The title came from a J.G. Ballard collection of what he called “condensed novels.” Ian liked the title and wrote lyrics before reading the book. DG The song is about a person locked in a mental institution because he feels he has no control over his body. People come to tour the asylum and see the freaks. The song ends up being a commentary about people’s fascination with the grotesque. “Isolation” “The squirrelly lead synth on the energetic but scared-out-of-its-wits Isolation” AMG integrated elements of synth-pop and electronic music with a “dead-simple drum machine track” DG cranked in the mix by Hannett. Ironically, considering the song title, it may be Joy Division’s most upbeat song. CS Morris said it sounded like a song people could actually dance to. He also recalled it being the first song they put together in the studio around synths. GQ Hook said it is “one of my best riffs and probably the closest we get to my actual live bass sound on either album.” BV “Passover” Morris noted that the song doesn’t have a regular beat and that the lyrics reflected an interest Curtis had in divinity. GQ With lines like “Is this the role that you wanted to live?” and “This is a crisis I knew had to come/Destroying the balance I’d kept” this also reads like a suicide note. In retrospect, the whole album feels like a suicide note. One can read a detailed breakdown of the song musically by professional musician Gordon Moakes at Medium.com. “Colony” The title is a reference to Franz Kafka’s 1919 short story “In the Penal Colony” CS in which the narrator “described the origins and uses of an elaborate torture device at a prison colony.” BV Morris said it is probably his favorite Joy Division song. “I really thought Ian’s lyrics on that one were absolutely fantastic.” GQ He was also proud of the drum riff, which he said was inspired by a Captain Beefheart song. BV Hook said it was “more of a traditional Joy Division rock song – probably the straightest on the LP.” BV “A Means to an End” Hook said this one was “a bit more poppy than ‘Colony.’” BV He explained that the bass was “centered around octaves – something that I nicked from disco songs. We would also later use that same octave technique on the synths for ‘Blue Monday.’” BV Morris noted that the song had an unusual vocal line that made it awkward to sing. GQ “Heart and Soul” The song demonstrates “minimal instrumentation masterwork, Peter Hook’s dangerous bassline clashing with the controlled drum beat.” PT Morris said it has a “hypnotic rhythm that just doesn’t stop. I remember in the studio doing it and you go into a bit of a trance while you're just playing the beat over and over because you couldn't just sample it.” GQ This song and “Twenty Four Hours” are “as perfect a demonstration of the tension/release or soft/loud approach as will ever be heard.” AMG “Twenty Four Hours” On “the jaw-dropping, wrenching” AMG Twenty Four Hours “Curtis embodies despair and pleas for an escape from loneliness. It’s a declaration of frustrated rage that remains subtle with unrelenting eerieness.” RV He sings: “Now that I've realized how it's all gone wrong / Gotta find some therapy, this treatment takes too long / Deep in the heart of where sympathy held sway / Gotta find my destiny, before it gets too late.” Hook said this was one of the last songs the band wrote together, BV but Morris said it was one of the first things the group did after Unknown Pleasures. GQ “The Eternal” This song, with “the drowned pianos underpinning Curtis’ shadowy moan” AMG showed how “keyboards…took the fore more so than ever.” AMG It evokes the mood that emo music would go on to convey. PT Curtis told Morris the song was about someone with Down’s syndrome. Curtis would see him in the park playing and he never seemed to age. GQ “Decades” “The album ender of album enders.” AMG It is “a long, slow crawl down and out, Curtis’ portrait of lost youth inevitably applied to himself soon after, its sepulchral string-synths are practically a requiem.” AMG This and “The Eternal” both showcase Morris’ “powerful and unsettling percussion.” PP Morris recalled that the song originally had a bossa nova beat GQ and that Tony Wilson, the founder of Factory Records to which Joy Division was signed, was trying to get Curtis to sound like Frank Sinatra. BV Notes: A 2007 CD remaster added a bonus disc with a live performance from the University of London Union.

Resources and Related Links: Joy Division’s DMDB Encyclopedia entry AMG All Music Guide review by Ned Raggett BV BrooklynVegan.com (7/20/20). “Joy Division’s Peter Hook & Stephen Morris celebrated 40 years of ‘Closer’ Tim’s Twitter Listening Party” by Erin Christie CS Consequence of Sound (5/18/20). “The Complicated Legacy of Joy Division’s Ian Curtis” by Dan Weiss DG Discogs.com (7/17/20). “There’s More than Gloom to Joy Division’s Final Album” by Morgan Enos GQ GQ Magazine (7/11/20). “How Joy Division Made Closer…” by Anna Conrad Medium.com (4/23/15). “Joy Division’s ‘Passover’: A Victory of Collective Restraint” By Gordon Moakes PP Post-Punk.com (7/18/15). album review PT Post-Trash.com (8/7/20). “Joy Division – ‘Closer’ (40th Anniversary Reissue) Album Review” QT TheQuietus.com (7/13/20). “40 Years Later: Closer & the Last Days of Joy Division” by Jonathan Wright RX Radio X (7/18/20). “Why the cover to Closer upset Joy Division fans” RV The Review “100 Greatest Albums of All Time” by Clarke Speicher (October – November 2001; Vol. 128: numbers 12-23). PR Paul Roland (2001). CD Guide to Pop & Rock. B.T. Batsford LTD: London. RS500 Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Albums of All Time WK Wikipedia ZS Zagat Survey (2003). Music Guide: 1,000 Top Albums of All Time. Zagat Survey, LLC: New York, NY. Page 136.