The band Angus Young labelled “poor imitators of The Who”
AC/DC are one of the most universally loved bands for a very good reason. Even Keith Richards, who has slandered everyone from The Beatles to Black Sabbath, said: “Bless their hearts, they are great little bungle of energy”, and heaped praise on their “always impressive” tightness. In many ways, the reason Angus Young and his cronies are so adored is because they abide so closely to the mantra “it’s only rock ‘n’ roll, but I like it”, that their act is a bulletproof showcase of zero pretence.
This facet has never been lost on Young, who has been more than happy to stay true to it throughout the band’s entire career. In fact, he seems to think that bands often falter when they try to develop beyond what made them beloved in the first place. While he hailed the early work of Led Zeppelin, he thinks they began to indulge themselves without truly offering anything all that new in later years, particularly in a live setting.
“I’ve seen that band live. They were on for three hours. For two-and-a-half hours, they bored the audience. Then at the end they pull out old rock ’n’ roll numbers to get the crowd movin’. That’s sick,” he told Classic Rock. In his view, it was also a sign of the band conceding that they knew what worked at heart and that they were merely copying the stars that had inspired them before they tried to push the mantle in a new direction.
“Led Zeppelin and all that have just been poor imitators of The Who and bands like that. That’s when I reckon it stopped,” he said regarding pure rock ‘n’ roll. However, he certainly doesn’t think that the genre met its end when things turned progressive and, in his view, more “boring” as music began “progressing the wrong way”. In fact, he figures the true spirit of the genre is always revitalised by fresh acts once the old ones go awry.
When it was put to him that Gene Simmons had recently stated rock ‘n’ roll was dead, Young joked, “Oh right, who’s he?” He continued: “I think when The Beatles came out, I think they gave their records to a lot of different record companies and a lot of them were coming back with that very same sort of line [rock ‘n’ roll is dead]. They said, ‘guitar music is finished’, and it is still going strong.”
Brian Johnson backed him up on this front, explaining: “It’s funny how many times rock ‘n’ roll has been dead. How many times people have said it has been dead. And it just keeps coming back like a bloody phoenix. It’s never gone, it is always there, it is the basis of every kind of music that you listen to.”
No doubt a hell of a lot of fans that have caught AC/DC on their present world tour will support that motion as they continue to champion the irreverent spirit of simple riffing and raucous energy.
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out Led Zeppelin Newsletter
All the latest stories about Led Zeppelin from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.