Review: It’s an AC/DC record.
Ok, so I guess I should elaborate.
AC/DC shrugs off recent bad news (Malcolm Young) and bad press (Phil Rudd) to deliver another riff heavy volume of music to their incredible catalogue of tunes.
What hasn’t changed in decades is the band’s sound, style and lyrical naffness (can that be a word please?).
But that naffness is forgiven with the first riff of Angus’ guitar, which is as essential to rock n roll life as oxygen and electricity.
On Rock Or Bust we are faced with a very quick fire 11 track/35 minute blast of classic rock, with the screechy vocals of Brian Johnson taking us back in time once again.
Unfortunately we aren’t propelled far enough back in time to when Brian was in better voice, but I’ll still take it.
I’m not sure, but maybe the theme of this album is….er….”rock”? (Rock Or Bust, Rock The Blues Away, Got Some Rock N Roll Thunder, Rock The House).
Well….not unexpectedly, it does rock. The band sounds energized and while they’ll never touch the classic material of the 70s or the stadium anthems of the 80s, they can still deliver a good tune.
It’s a pretty solid album – it would want to be for only 35 minutes – there’s a few stand outs, but also a couple of tracks that really do plod along.
On the winners list are the first 4 tracks, which all rock along at a good pace, especially Play Ball and Rock The Blues Away.
Baptism Of Fire is a good bar room rock-n-boogie; Sweet Candy is cool and Emission Control is an old-school rocker.
Missing the mark for me are the tracks where the band just plods along a little too much - Got Some Rock & Roll Thunder and Hard Times in particular.
A decent album. You can’t expect too much more after all these years. The band can still deliver some old school songs and some memorable guitar riffs. They might be a bit rusty and predictable, but it ain’t noise pollution, so moderate thumbs up from me.
