AC/DC are celebrating their 50th anniversary, and the band will perform for the first time since 2016 later this year at the Power Trip Festival in California.
Recently, Classic Rock Magazine did a lengthy retrospective on AC/DC to celebrate the occasion and spoke to numerous rock ’n’ roll luminaries including KISS singer/guitarist Paul Stanley.
The KISS frontman shared what he thought about Brian Johnson joining the band to replace the late Bon Scott in 1980.
“When Brian Johnson joined AC/DC, I was curious – like everyone was – about how that would impact the band and the chemistry they had with Bon Scott,” Stanley said. “But what they created with ‘Back In Black’ was just monumental. The way that album starts with ‘Hells Bells,’ it hit me like the first time I heard Black Sabbath – like, ‘Holy s*it!’”
“With ‘Back In Black,’ the band’s sound was polished to some degree. They were building on what they’d done before, moving forward. That kind of bare-bones grit they had in the early days was replaced with this driving sonic overload. But it was so brilliant. I thought what was gained overrode what was lost.”
“AC/DC are the real deal, and I knew that from the first time I saw them. It was at the Whisky A Go Go in LA sometime in the mid-seventies. They were so gritty, and the adrenaline level was just crazy. The amount of energy that Angus [Young] was expending on stage was mind-boggling.”
KISS has a long history of taking bands they feel have potential out on the road as openers. AC/DC opened for KISS on the Alive II tour in North America.
“We’ve never made anybody famous, but we gave bands a chance. You put them in an arena, and the audience either does this [makes thumbs up gesture], but between Judas Priest and Mötley Crüe and Bon Jovi and Mellencamp and Tom Petty, AC/DC, Rush, we have a pretty good track record of bands that we liked and had us in their corner.”
