AC/DC: Highway to Hell

AC/DC : Highway to Hell

1979

Atlantic Records

Format I Own it On: Vinyl and compact disc

Track Listing: 1. Highway to Hell  2. Girl's got Rhythm  3. Walk All Over You  4. Touch Too Much  5. Beating Around the Bush  6. Shot Down in Flames  7. Get it Hot  8. If You Want Blood (You've Got It)  9. Love Hungry Man  10. Night Prowler

AC/DC's 6th studio record, their first with Mutt Lange (who pretty much only produces shit records now, but back in the day he had a pretty good run) finds the band ever so slightly adjusting their sound to create a more radio-ready, hard-pop-rock sound. The riffs are ridiculously catchy. Just try and get "Girl's Got Rhythm" out of your head! You can't!

Bon goes out on a high note with "Night Prowler." Everything great about him appears on this song.  Leering menace! Drunken squealing!, Nanu nanu! You can only go on to wonder what "Back in Black" could have been if he was still around...

 

This record has been around my whole life. I remember being fascinated by the airbrushed devil tail Angus is holding on the cover...which doesn't appear on the original, much more hellish, Australian cover...



I think I prefer the international cover this time. I like the fact that it's just a drab-looking band shot where one of the band members just happens to be ol' Scratch himself.

 I purchased my current vinyl copy somewhere in the 90's... and it's pretty great cos some one appraised how attractive they found each band member in pen on the cover...

It may be hard to tell from the terrible picture I took, but if you look around the giant flash, you'll see the Young brothers both have "Ugly" scrawled across their faces, while the other three have "OK" written on theirs... Angus' face also has something written very lightly across his chin that is hard to make out in the photo, but it appears to say "Joy." Perhaps that was the name of the person who owned this record before me. Maybe she wrote all over it!  "Are all men just MEAT to you? Huh, Joy?!?! HUH, ?!!?!?!"


So let's say our goodbyes to Bon in style, rocking out to "Girls Got Rhythm!"