Five years of hard work was finally paying off for the Australian heavy metal quintet known as AC/DC. The group's 1979 album, Highway to Hell, produced by Robert John "Mutt" Lange, proved to be the band's breakthrough. It climbed to No. 17 on the Billboard album chart, putting AC/DC in the league of such American hard-rock acts as Aerosmith and Ted Nugent. Then, on February 19, 1980, singer Bon Scott was found dead after a night of drinking. He had choked on his vomit. The band's road to success had seemingly hit a dead end.
But AC/DC, led by guitarists Angus and Malcolm Young, refused to give up. Scott sound-alike Brian Johnson, formerly of the band Geordie, was recruited and officially joined the band on this day (March 29) in 1980.
With Lange once again manning the board, the band recorded the triumphant Back in Black, which saluted Scott while simultaneously ushering in his successor. The album, buoyed by Young's power chords and Johnson's throaty vocals, climbed all the way to number four, securing AC/DC's position as one of the most popular hard-rock groups in the world.
AC/DC's popularity was now so great that in 1981 Atlantic Records dug into their vaults and released 1976's Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, which had previously been issued in the U.K. but not in America. Although the album, featuring Scott on vocals, was five years old, it became AC/DC's highest-charting album to date, reaching number three. Another 1976 album, High Voltage, which had failed to chart upon its initial U.S. release, finally did so and made No. 146 - quite respectable for a five-year-old record. But AC/DC was primed for the biggest album of its career with its third charting album of 1981.
That came with For Those About to Rock, which topped the Billboard album chart for three weeks, beginning Dec. 26, 1981.
Remarkably, AC/DC is still active today, albeit with some lineup changes over the years. Rhythm guitarist Malcom Young left the band in 2014, due to dementia and died three years later due to complications caused by the disease.
Drummer Phil Rudd has been in and out of the band with stints from 1975-1983, 1994-2015 and 2018 through the present, but he no longer tours with the group.
Even Johnson has had his time away from the band. In 2016, he was suffering from hearing loss and was temporarily replaced by Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose for the remainder of the band's tour that year.
The one constant since the beginning has been Angus Young, the duck-walking, schoolboy uniform-wearing fixture of the band, who will celebrate his 69th birthday on Sunday (March 31).
The band recently announced its Power Up European Tour, belatedly supporting their 2020 album Power Up. It kicks off May 17 in Gelsenkirchen, Germany and runs through Aug. 17 in Dublin, Ireland. The band's current touring lineup features Johnson, Angus Young, rhythm guitarist Stevie Young (Malcom's nephew), former Jane's Addiction bassist Chris Chaney, and drummer Matt Laug, who's worked with Alanis Morissette, Slash's Snakepit and Alice Cooper. Long may they rock!
