AC/DC

Debuted New Year�s Eve, 1973, at the Chequers Club in Sydney, Australia. Founding brothers Angus and Malcolm Young led the band through a number of personnel shifts in the early stages, but hit the jackpot with the addition of lead singer, Bon Scott. The addition of drummer Phillip Rudd and bassist Mark Evans in 1974 rounded out a group that quickly established a solid reputation in their native Australia, but it took several years before they became a presence on the American charts.

The band released two albums � High Voltage and TNT � in Australia in 1974 and 1975. Material from the two albums was used to create the version of High Voltage that was released in the U.S. and U.K. With the release of Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap in 1976, the band was gathering a following, and the 1977 release of Let There Be Rock became the first album to chart in the U.S.

The band was as well-known for their live performances as for their albums. Lead singer Bon Scott, originally the group�s chauffeur, will probably never be described as one of the era�s great singers. His vocals were almost painfully rough, but his stage persona was provocative and swaggering. Angus Young was fond of mooning the audience, which led to the group being banned from several British venues. Combined with Scott�s convictions for minor criminal offenses and his rejection by the Australian Army as being �socially maladjusted,� the band�s reputation as crude brutes flourished.

If their behavior wasn�t enough to establish a sufficiently �bad boy� image, their lyrics certainly were. They veered from violent images to crude sexual references, and the double entendre became their forte. Some of the most notorious lyrics came from the Dirty Deeds album. The title song is basically a hit man�s advertisement:

If you got a lady and you want her gone
But you ain't got the guts
She keeps naggin' at you night and day
Enough to drive you nuts -
Pick up the phone
Leave her alone
It's time you made a stand
For a fee
I'm happy to be
Your back door man

And of course, the manically cheerful �Big Balls:�

I'm upper, upper class high society
God's gift to ballroom notoriety
And I always fill my ballroom
The event is never small
All the social papers say I've got the biggest balls of all

Brutes or not, by the time Highway to Hell came along in 1979, the band had become a force to be reckoned with, although it was a toss-up what was better known � Angus Young�s gritty, blues-based guitar riffs, or his bizarre school-uniform stage apparel. Highway became the group�s first million-seller in the U.S., and went to number 17 on the U.S. charts.

It seemed as though AC/DC�s relentless march would be sidelined in 1980. Bon Scott died on February 20, 1980, after what was described as a �routine� night of partying. The coroner�s report stated that he had �drunk himself to death.� To this day, the most common story told is that Scott died from choking on his own vomit after an all-night drinking binge, although the official cause of death was eventually ruled hypothermia.

Although they briefly considered breaking up, the group found a suitable replacement with Brian Johnson, and returned to the studio to record Back in Black. Despite worries that Scott�s shoes were too big to fill, the album proved to be the group�s biggest album. It peaked at number four on the U.S. charts, and went platinum in October 1980, and continues to sell over 20 years after its release, being certified double diamond in July 2004.

Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap was re-issued for the U.S. market in 1981 and went to number 3. The band followed-up Black in late 1981 with For Those About to Rock We Salute You, which became the group�s only number one U.S. album. While albums through the late 80�s and early 90�s couldn�t live up to the band�s commercial success of the earlier years, their albums regularly go platinum, although oddly, the band has never had a top 20 single in the U.S. Their live shows also continue to be a huge success. In 2002, Q magazine put AC/DC at the top of their list of the �50 Bands to See Before You Die�.

In March 2003, AC/DC became members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Steven Tyler of Aerosmith inducted the group into the Hall, and spoke for legions of their fans:

"AC/DC became the litmus test of what rock does. Does it make you clench your fist when you sing along? Does it scare your parents to hell, and piss off the neighbours? Does it make you dance so close to the fire that you burn your feet--and still don't give a rat's ass? Does it make you want to stand up and scream for something that you're not even sure of yet? Does it make you want to boil your sneakers, and make soup outta your girlfriend's panties? If it doesn't, then it ain't AC/DC".