Why Brian Johnson almost turned down AC/DC: “I wasn’t gonna do it”
When Bon Scott passed away, AC/DC had an impossible task ahead of them. They had already started to become one of the most dangerous bands ever to touch a stage, and yet their mouthpiece had abruptly fallen silent after Scott was found dead in a car in 1980 of acute alcohol poisoning. Life after death was possible once Brian Johnson came into the picture, but he wasn’t sure he had what it took to replace Scott when he first got the call.
As much as Johnson could ignite a stage when he wanted to, it’s not like he was replacing some random pinup star. Sure, the Young Brothers may have written all the songs, but Scott was the glue that took everything and turned it into blistering hard rock, making songs like ‘TNT’ and ‘Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap’ sound absolutely humungous.
It’s not to say that Johnson couldn’t sing those songs, but they were much different from the comfort of his usual vocal range. Whereas Scott is all charisma from the moment he opens his mouth, Johnson gets there through raw intensity, taking all the foundations of rock and roll and combining them with the sound of a rabid rottweiler.
In fact, the Newcastle native Johnson had indirectly been recommended to the Aussue group by someone on the inside: Bon Scott himself. As the group were working on their next records, Scott came in one day raving about Johnson’s ability to sing in his old band, Geordie, despite the fact that he saw him on the night his appendix had burst.
If it weren’t for a chance commercial for vacuum cleaners, though, Johnson would have gladly passed on the audition, telling Louder, “I wasn’t gonna do it, but a friend of mine, Andre, phoned us and said: ‘Brian, I have an advert I think would suit you fine. It’s £350.’ That was a big lump of money. It was a proper job for Hoover. And I thought, hang on, I could probably go down and do the AC/DC thing on the same day. I just thought, I hope I get this ad thing.”
While hearing Johnson singing about the wonders of getting your carpets and hardwood floors in decent shape is funnier today than anything else, he knew exactly what he wanted to do when he got to sit down with the rest of the band. He had at least gotten a good rapport with everyone, but he still had to be put through his paces.
When working on songs like ‘Back in Black’ and ‘Hells Bells,’ Johnson remembered being pushed to his absolute limits when trying to get the right vocal take, occasionally thinking that the entire thing would be scrapped once AC/DC found a real singer. Once the first mixes came in, though, no one needed to worry anymore.
Not only did Johnson manage to sound like the perfect rock and roll frontman, but he also got the chance to do service to the man who he was filling in for, turning a song like ‘Hells Bells’ into an immortal anthem for the fallen frontman. AC/DC could have easily called it quits after Highway to Hell and no one would have complained, but in terms of their success later on, Johnson might not be giving himself enough credit for the impact he made on the band.
