AC/DC - Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be! Page 4
by Tim Henderson
Early North American releases out of order...
Angus: "It was because we had played most of Europe, we had played
most of Britain and a lot of other countries around that area. We came to
America the first time in mid- '77, and at the time they had released our
first album, High Voltage, and what they had done was taken our first two
Australian releases (High Voltage - 1974 and TNT - 1975) and put them
together. They had signed us in '76, so our record company felt if they put
a combination of those two records together it would be a good
introduction. That's how that came about. Then we released the album Dirty
Deeds for the European side of the world. We had just finished recording
Let There Be Rock so the North Americans said 'We want what's current, so
we'll have Let There Be Rock.' It was a bit strange, but they felt that
they wanted the current thing and they felt it would be great because they
knew we were going to be touring in the summer for the first time so they
wanted a good strong introduction. And for us it was a good thing too
because we were very proud of the Let There Be Rock album, especially
Malcolm and myself because for the first time we could really feature the
guitars."
Mutt Lange...
Angus: "Well with Mutt it was the first time he had ever worked
with us, and I don't even think at that point that he had even had a big
album, a big success. I think he'd had a few single successes in this part
of the world but he hadn't had a major album and for us it was our first
time really working with someone else as a producer. But we felt it was a
good combination because we had wanted to try a few different things. Up
until that point we had made a lot more in your face rock and roll and we
wanted to try a couple of medium style rock tracks."
Americanization...
Angus: "Well you stuck to your guns. There was a bit of a worry,
especially the title, Highway To Hell. They were a bit worried, especially
from the American south as to whether it would be played. But we had said
'You know this is what we called it and this is what we like' and so we
stuck to our guns. And it's funny enough, all those southern states were
the first ones to play it!"
AC/DC - Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be! Page 5