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From the bars to the arenas, learn the fascinating stories of how our biggest rock music legends made the leap. Each episode reveals the stories, songs and little known facts of the journey from obscurity to fame of one of rock music’s biggest stars. Join us on Garage To Stadiums as host Dave Anthony teams up with an author of a rock biography or director of a rock documentary to explore that journey, their early years, the stories behind the scenes, their top songs, and their place in music history.
Learn about the passion, talent, luck and even scandal that often came together to propel these stars from obscurity to household names.
Dave Anthony 0:01
Hi there. I'm Dave Anthony and this is the garage to stadiums podcast. On each episode we tell you the story of how one of our music legends rose from obscurity to fame, and play some of the songs that mark that journey. Today's show is about the career of AC DC with author Martin Popoff, who's written several books profiling bands, including AC DC. The band hails from Sydney, Australia and has sold an estimated 200 million albums which would be like if two out of every three Americans owned an AC DC record. The band's key figures from their origins in 1973 and Sydney have been the Australian brothers rhythm guitarist Malcolm young, and lead guitarist Angus Young these small but mighty men standing just over five feet tall have perfected the simple straight ahead Rock and Roll sound of ACDC Angus in fact, has a further gimmick on stage, which is he dresses in the schoolboy and shorts that you may recall this band seems to cut across various genres in terms of fans fans from punk alternative classic rock and pop all seem to admire AC DC for its straightforward rock tunes like dirty deeds Done Dirt Cheap shook me all night long back in black, Thunderstruck and more. The band's songs have been sampled by the Beastie Boys and covered by bands like Guns and Roses quiet riot, the offspring Joan Jett, Twisted Sister, and even Shakira. The country group big and rich even covered the band's tune shook me all night long. If you don't believe ACDC music is important. Check out the study that shows and I'm not kidding about this. The study shows that surgeons perform cleaner, faster cuts when listening to AC DC piped into operating rooms. Some notable fans of the band include Keith Richards, Eddie Van Halen, Ozzy Osbourne, Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters, alternative country singer Ryan Adams, and many more. Here to talk about the band's journey from the garage. The stadiums and the tragedy that seems to constantly underpin this band is Martin Popoff. A little bit about Martin Martin has unofficially written more record reviews than anybody in the history of music Writing Across all genres. That number incredibly, currently stands at 7900 reviews. Additionally, apartness penned approximately 120 books on hard rock, heavy metal, classic rock, and punk. Martin is a sought after researcher having contributed to the 11 episode metal evolution, and 10 Episode rock icons, both series for VH. One, one of his most recent books, and the one we're going to talk about today is AC DC at 50. And gorgeous coffee table book full of AC DC facts, concert photos, memorabilia, and album by album reviews. Welcome to garage to stadium with Martin.
Martin Popoff 2:59
Yes, thank you very much. Looking forward to this.
Dave Anthony 3:02
Let's go back to the beginning. Tell us where Malcolm Angus, the young family they're sort of the, the nucleus of this band from the beginning. Where did they grow up? What was their family life like
Martin Popoff 3:17
it was essentially poverty? You know, they they had a large family. They're in Scotland, and you know, and I've even seen theories that said, you know, they were they were, you know, short guys short, thin guys and stuff, because of the pollution growing up in Scotland and the water, you know, lead in the water and things like that, right? So, yeah, they emigrate to Scotland, you know, they're young, but they love rock and roll, you know, they're raised on the Beatles and The Rolling Stones and Chuck Berry, the blues kind of thing
Dave Anthony 4:05
So how did they come up with the AC DC name?
Martin Popoff 4:09
You know, the name comes from on the AC adapter of their Sister Margaret sewing machine, it said ACDC. And they thought that was a good name.
Dave Anthony 4:16
So as the youngest of I believe it was eight children. Angus gets involved in the band. And I've read that Angus had a variety of different personas on stage before he settles on the schoolboy uniform. Look, how did that schoolboy uniform look come about?
Martin Popoff 4:34
Yeah, so that was an idea of Margaret's. I mean, he literally did wear a schoolboy uniform. And he was a schoolboy and Margaret's kind of concept was always this kind of cool. This idea of you know, Angus rushing off from school and just bounding on to stage and playing and he's he's the short little guy. I mean, they had the the gorilla outfit before and like you were saying, I mean, they come from
Dave Anthony 4:55
Yeah, like he did gorilla. He did a gorilla fit Superman Zorro. And finally settles on the schoolboy uniform.
Martin Popoff 5:02
one interesting thing that Malcolm said to me, I got to interview him, as Malcolm put it, when you when you play the bars, and you play these pubs in these these, you know, far flung outposts and farming towns and whatnot. The thing that that that, that the, you know, the patrons recognize, I mean, they're working hard, they're playing hard. They're drinking what they recognize, and what and what goes into their brain and makes sense is like, like a boogie woogie pattern. Right? Right. Biggie is the idea of sped up blues, right. So ACDC a definitely had this this large, bougie DNA, which again, comes from their love of the Rolling Stones, and Chuck Berry, and they started to incorporate that into their own songs. But this is how you kept those guys happy, and he didn't get beat up. And he did get pennies thrown at you. I don't know if ACDC ever told this story. But I remember Ozzie saying this once and I thought it was hilarious that that people at bars would would like take out take out their lighters and or matches or whatever and heat up pennies, and then throw them at you. Wow. So you get hot pennies throw they're pretty funny. But But Malcolm essentially said the same thing. I mean, people would throw bottles, we hear of the famous cages that they had in the American South, you know, you'd play inside a cage so bottles wouldn't hit you and stuff, right? But But yeah, this was you know, there were demanding crowds. And Boogie rock is what translated and went into their brains and gave them a good time for that that night.
Dave Anthony 6:37
as Martin says, the band goes through some early iterations and personnel changes. They go from the glam rock to sort of the pop rock straight ahead, r&b style rock and roll. They look for another lead singer. And after, you know, deciding that the current lead singer, the glam phase isn't going to work with the style change. Tell us about the background of the infamous bond Scott, he becomes a bit of a legendary figure in this band. How did he come on as the lead singer?
You know, bond Scott, actually, same sort of situation where were you know, born in Scotland, emigrated to Australia. So there was a large emigration to to Australia. Yes, so bond Scott had been around He's a little older than the guys little taller than the guys a little rougher than the guys. And he had been in Valentine. So you know, you listen to his early stuff. So he'd been in Valentine's and then and then naturally what happens is you move from this kind of embarrassing showband pop band.
Yeah, it was kind of like a bubble gum kind of boyband almost wasn't it
Martin Popoff 7:44
he's working as a chauffeur and stuff I think drove them around a little bit, I believe. Anyways, he eventually gets into the band. And, and it just makes a lot of sense. He's got this great voice. He starts singing, rougher, he starts using kind of a different voice than he had with these other bands.
Dave Anthony 8:00
So bond takes over the lead vocals in about 73 or 74 and starts to assist Martin in the songwriting process with young brothers Malcolm and Angus and this formula starts to clicks.
Martin Popoff 8:43
Ron brings to the band is everybody loves his his persona hit? Everybody loves his voice. He's got kind of a nice wordplay. There are a lot of sexual double entendres in the in the lyrics, but they're kind of like good natured and there's there's no real edge to them. And everybody just thinks he's the coolest guy right? All the guys want to be like him. And all the girls want to be with him sort of thing. He's got this persona on stage where he wears these tight jeans and he's off the doesn't have a shirt on. He's bigger than the guys he's older than the guys so he so he kind of looks like a tough guy up on stage. He's sinewy, right, so he's kind of like, like, muscular and thin. Sometimes he's got a bit of a vest on or whatever. He's got long black hair. And he's he's kind of goofy. He's like a little bit of a Dennis the Menace character up there.
Dave Anthony 9:31
Yeah, he definitely adds to that sort of pub rock. Bad boy image. He looks like he's ready for a fight with his shirt off. We go on from high voltage to Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, and that yields a massive hit.
So the band starts Martin heavily touring the UK they're trying to get gig after gig and what the London scene and a variety of other cities to try to obviously break in beyond Australia. Tell us about the UK days yeah
Martin Popoff 10:44
so what happens is AC DC gets signed out of the UK to begin with you know management gets them some gigs so all of a sudden they're playing these gigs a lineup start to former Are you know around the block sort of thing they play up and down the UK a fair bit. It's the middle of the punk scene, right so they look a little bit like punks they're playing really simple music and some of the ads kind of like portray them as a punk band but they're they're kind of portrayed a little bit that way the band pushes back and says we think this punk stuff is really stupid because they're old school they believe in playing well and recording well, even though what they're doing is simple and there's that alignment with it. And then we get to the first you know, simultaneously released less complicated album Let There Be Rock everywhere
Speaker 1 11:47
so we get another studio album from them and it gets some acclaim as well and people like it. It's famously Keith Richards says, oh, it's one of my favorite ACD you know, one of my favorite albums he loved he loved power age.
Dave Anthony 11:59
then comes a seminal album that finally has them cracking the US charts and that album is Highway to Hell. And the formula of bond Scott singing and writing with guitarist brothers Malcolm and Angus is really starting to fire on all cylinders. But there is another secret additive in that high octane formula and that was in the form of a new producer. Their previous producers had been Harry Vanda and their older brother George Young. Can you tell us Martin a little bit about the background of the new producer who helped them step up their game?
Martin Popoff 12:32
Yeah, so So Mutt Lang came from South America. He was he was a musician himself. He comes in and he's kind of a bit of a song doctor he will tear songs apart you will make you do many many takes and makes the band sound much more professional I would a hell is just Action Pack start to finish really, really accessible, great books. The big songs on there are are obviously the title track Highway to Hell.
Lot of great songs on that album, but yeah, a lot of credit to Mott Lang. Lang
Dave Anthony 13:49
goes on to produce as you said Def Leppard. Ultimately, even marry Shania Twain at one point and produces her brings her to fame. But just as they achieved their creative Pinnacle with Highway to Hell, comes the worst kind of tragedy imaginable. Bond Scott is found dead in 1980. What are the events? Martin surrounding the tragedy of lead singer Bob Scott's death?
Martin Popoff 14:14
Yeah, so So ACDC is going to lose bond Scott. And what happens is, you know, typical night on the town for bond, the drinking starts early in the day. There's a lot of mystery around it. But there's a lot of drinking and going out to clubs. They're in there in London, right? And what happens later on in the night gets a little more mysterious. They talk about heroin being involved, and I've heard different stories, but the story is that maybe bond does it but he's not really used to heroin, but he's, he does it just to be one of the boys and keep the party going deep into the night sort of thing. He ends up falling asleep in a buddy's car. And it dies, he slumps over he cut his head kind of ends up, you know, in an awkward position, you know, down by the gearbox the console in the middle. And, you know, officially I think the cause of death was asphyxiation on his own vomit, so is more like, and then combined with freezing to death and then people say heroin is involved in.
Dave Anthony 15:18
So imagine this must have been incredibly difficult for the band, you have a formula working with a lead singer who's very recognizable for his voice, and you have a few massive hits. Imagine the Rolling Stones replacing Mick Jagger or YouTube replacing Bano or Led Zeppelin without Robert Plant, or any famous band suddenly, without their distinctive lead singer who also helped craft their most popular tunes in the catalog to that point, how did the band Martin deal with this void?
Martin Popoff 15:48
Well, so when they lose bond, they basically kind of look at each other and say, We we've got to keep moving forward, we've got a lot of momentum here. You know, they, they a lot of different names are thrown around. But but one that even Bond had had told them was, you know, anything ever happens to me, you know, Brian Johnson, what a great singer, you know, he, he's, he's, you know, essentially the bond approved choice. And the reason anybody knew about Brian Johnson is is he's so he's from from the Northeast from New Castle and and he had a band called Jordi and they were kind of like an AC DC band Ryan had started, you know, a business of his own, tried a few different things.
Dave Anthony 16:32
In the what didn't you have an auto parts company, a small company, like he was talking to the business kind of thing. So
Martin Popoff 16:38
he had a business going and, and just to almost as a lark, he, he decided to, you know, people that oh, why don't you try out for this thing and, and he and he gets the job, right? He looks the part. He's like, he's like a short, stocky kind of guy.
Dave Anthony 16:52
What is Brian Johnson's personality, like,
Martin Popoff 16:54
kind of like an amiable one of the boys personality, kind of even a leader personality. I like a bond Scott. But his his height is, is closer in stature to these other guys. And he's got this, you know, complete monster of a crazy scary voice to go along with things. So the voice kind of lines up, it's almost even a more extreme voice than you had on bond Scott so so he fits into the band. You know, they respect him because he's been on records before. They like the fact that he's, he's from the UK, but he's not from London, you know, he's kind of like a working class kind of guy. And he comes in and they don't and they don't miss a beat.
Dave Anthony 18:03
You'd have a great story in the book about how he couldn't even afford a ticket to London from Newcastle, but happened to be hired for some commercial work for his voice. And that was how he got the funds to take the trip. And then he gets the gig with bond Scott gun, the band has their back against the wall and how to continue remember, Brian Johnson is not a proven commodity when he's plucked out of his job, a small company, imagine yourself in that position. In addition, he's also asked to try his hand at Songwriting with the young brothers. And you could have not asked for a better response from this newly group of songwriters who are thrown together and the monster hit. Well, there were several of them but this next song shook me all night long.
you're a young person in that era, the anthems from this rocking Ozzy band were the party anthems at a heck of a lot of parties, and played in student parking lots of schools across several nations.
Martin Popoff 19:55
That album was basically the soundtrack to my great leavener grade 12 or whatever it was both probably, you know, blush parties and drinking and the whole bit. I mean, it was literally the drinking album of my, my last years of high school. And so it's an it's an amazing, it's amazingly bright uptempo party album. So I was a crazy music guy and already, you know, started work at 1516 years old in stereo stores, running record departments in my small town. And so, I was selling stereos and stuff I remember. We use this as a test record, right? This was, you know, down in the basement with the $20,000 stereos I remember, we used it all the time, and it blew people away, you know, through these massive systems. But, you know, so it had you shook me all night long, which was, which was a big dance song and the girls liked it. So you had this sort of crossover thing happening, but at the same time, you had Hells Bells, you know, with the big ring in the bell and that was kind of really ominous dark.
Lot of the other songs were quite heavy on it, the production was really good. So you have Mont Lang producing this album again, he gives them a completely different sound, and they add on Highway to Hell. And I often make the point that all through the 80s they're essentially touring this album.
Dave Anthony 21:50
All right, so Mutt Lange is on album number two with the band in terms of back and black. And in 1981 comes the album for those about to rock.
We a bit of a dry period and Sue's through the 80s and it doesn't seem to affect them as the back catalogue just keeps selling and they sell out tours. So
Martin Popoff 22:42
back in black continues to sell but they've now had three albums in a row that haven't done that well at all yet they're still kind of a big band. Malcolm Young has has a drinking problem at this point he's he's he basically says look, I gotta get I gotta get my alcoholism looked at or
Dave Anthony 22:59
Malcolm overcomes his drinking problem commits to bringing the band back and better than ever. And the writing and music come together and resurrect with another hit album called Razor's Edge, which yields the massive hit thunderstruck, which comes out and restores the heavyweight title for AC DC in the heavy rock arena. And if you've been to a sporting event, you'll likely have heard this song rubbing the crowd up.
Martin Popoff 23:59
They come up with thunderstruck, which is essentially their biggest sports stadium anthem. It's either that or for those about to rock they're both big back and black is they got a lot of them right back and black is big too. But basically, it sells a lot more than all of the previous three albums probably combined, actually. So yeah, they they are in this in they enter the 90s with this surprise, our rejuvenation of their career.
Dave Anthony 24:26
So now the band it's funny, they've always maintained their blue collar approach. They love their working class image which is kind of funny now because they're sort of rock and roll royalty selling up around 150 plus million albums at that point and they write a tune off that album razor's edge you know that has this blue you know the blue collar band sneering at the money in class with the tune Money Talks.
In the band interest the Hall of Fame Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003 is introduced by Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, calling them the Thunder from Down Under, they continue to tour back and Black still sells to this day. Something in the order of 50 plus million albums, it's up there with the Eagles Greatest Hits Hotel California and thriller. I mean these this is a killer album that still sells the band is finally recognized by the award shows and receives a Grammy Award in 2009 for its song war machine.
And this band seems to have a continual flirtation with tragedy that serves to sort of try to upset the ACDC ship. Periodically tell us what happens to Malcolm young and 2014 tragedy strikes again. And then Brian Johnson as well.
Martin Popoff 26:33
Yeah, so sadly, Malcolm Young is diagnosed with dementia, sadly, he dies. They lose their producer as well. George Young, so Malcolm and George die within close proximity to each other. And then Brian Johnson, you know, people are noticing that he's not singing so great. But they find out that a lot of it has to do with his loss of hearing loss. So he went through some really pioneering and he worked closely with the with a company that was working on this technology to help his hearing, and he came back
Dave Anthony 27:06
a parently a doctor reached out to Brian to say he could help and the doctor was a fanatical ac dc fan and ultimately performed a procedure on Brian which helped to restore some of his hearing loss. What's the current status of the band? I know at one point they replaced Brian Johnson and because of his hearing issues with Axl Rose, lead singer of Guns and Roses, he actually toured with them. They
Martin Popoff 27:34
did have that dalliance with Axl Rose, who did a really good job singing for them but it his famous so outsize that it's almost like a distraction. Yeah, he's American and all that. So it doesn't feel like they should go that route. And nobody's talking about that route. But basically, it looks like they are going to be able to get another record in and, and whether they can tour and keep their reputation.
Dave Anthony 27:59
So Martin, we're sort of near the end here, what is the place in history that you think ACDC occupies?
Martin Popoff 28:06
Well, I would say their place in history is entirely unique. The problem is, is what they came up with was so unique to them, and egoless. And so simple, simple, lyrically simple musically, it's just kind of like rock and roll riffs slowly moved into a heavy metal space. So essentially, their place in history is they've moved through all of these decades, as for all intents and purposes, the only band doing this kind of music, and they got really, really, really big at it. If I'm to add one. One other thing in terms of you know, why they went from the garage to stadiums, so to speak, is that you know, and we didn't really talk about this, but the nature of their music is such that when you play it live in a small venue with sound challenges, or a big venue with sound challenges, everything is very discernible, you can hear what's going on. So that helped them along along the way as well, by just being just sounding really good in any size venue from those small wins in the beginning, to the big ones later on.
Dave Anthony 29:15
Yeah, their simplicity has produced such a successful formula. It's almost like they took Chuck Berry's original riffs and just made them heavier, harder and just, you know, literally added to that sort of original r&b sound. And man, they kept it and made it their own. So
Martin Popoff 29:35
AC DC part of their formula all the time all through this thing was as you so eloquently put it, harder and heavier Chuck Berry, but you take that switch and whip it over to B and you got actual heavy metal riffs massaged in with the whole thing along the way as well.
Dave Anthony 29:51
All right, Martin, we're down to the Martin pop of picks three picks of lesser known ACDC tears. We all know the answer Some arena songs that everyone's sings in the stadiums. Yeah,
Martin Popoff 30:04
so I picked for the early days what's next to the moon so this one's just like I say a bit of a southern rocky sort of salt
Dave Anthony 30:26
song pick number two,
Martin Popoff 30:28
Song pick number two is Bedlam in Belgium and Bedlam in Belgium is just the story of some right that kicked off when they were in Belgium but it's just a good rockin song that represents how great that flick of the switch album is.
Okay, so for not my pick for number three, so the later years a ballbreaker. What I like about this song is that it's fairly heavy. But as it picks up, it gets really heavy and snarling.
Dave Anthony 31:24
You know, it's interesting that the to bookend albums, you've got Mutt Lange is the producer of one, but you've got to lead singers on each of the bigger albums right? The Highway to Hell and Back and black. That's an interesting dichotomy.
Martin Popoff 31:40
That's a great point. Dave. That's a really excellent point.
Dave Anthony 31:42
There you have it. Martin Popoff, who wrote this incredible book, which I urge everyone to pick up. We'll have links at our site to the book. Thank you so much for being on garage to stadiums today.
Martin Popoff 31:54
Thank you, Dave, a lot of fun.
Dave Anthony 31:57
And some closing notes on ACDC. On today's episode, we discussed the phenomenal sales of the album Back in Black from 1980. Worldwide, it has sold 50 plus million albums and still sells at enormous rates today. Go to our website garage to stadiums.com if you want to hear the garage, the stadiums official playlist of ACDC and gas Martin pop offs three deep cuts while at our website under the shownotes. For the AC DC episode, we'll have some bonus content, including clips of that 2003 Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony of AC DC and their performance that night. With Steven Tyler of Aerosmith performing you shook me all night long. You can quiz your friends musical knowledge as we've included the surprising list of bands that have covered AC DC songs over the years from rock to country artists. Thanks for joining us today. We've hope you've enjoyed the garage the stadium story of AC DC special thanks to our guests Martin Popoff, author of AC DC 50 and our producers Rhys waters and Sarah McLellan. You've been listening to garage two stadiums another blast furnace labs production. I'm Dave Anthony. Join us again for another garage to stadium story.
Unknown Speaker 33:17
This has been a Podstarter production
Transcribed by https://otter.ai