I'm sick to death of people saying we've made 11 albums that sounds exactly the same, Infact, we've made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.
Angus Young
I just go where the guitar takes me.
I think that's what it is with rock music. It helps you hang tough, I guess.
I can't deny that Eric Clapton's and Eddie Van Halen's lead stuff has influenced a stack of people, but for me, it's the rhythm thing that's way more impressive and important to a band.
You've got to love what you do. You've got to like doing it, because it is a lot of your life.
I saw Deep Purple live once and I paid money for it and I thought, 'Geez, this is ridiculous.' You just see through all that sort of stuff. I never liked those Deep Purples or those sort of things. I always hated it. I always thought it was a poor man's Led Zeppelin.
I never bothered with cars. I was probably one of the few kids in school who didn't run around with hot-rod magazines. As I would be at home fiddling with my guitar, they would be fiddling with a car engine.
If I heard a noise at night, I'd think there was a burglar sneaking around; the first thing I'd do was check on my guitar.
Every guitarist I would cross paths with would tell me that I should have a flashy guitar, whatever the latest fashion model was, and I used to say, 'Why? Mine works, doesn't it? It's a piece of wood and six strings, and it works.'
Yes, we're still five little people with a noisy attitude.
We're a rock group. we're noisy, rowdy, sensational and weird.
There are all sorts of cute puppy dogs, but it doesn't stop people from going out and buying Dobermans.
I remember one of the first gigs I played with that amp was at a local church. They wanted someone to fill in with the guitar and my friend say, 'Ah, he can play.' And so I dragged the amplifier down and started playing and everybody started yelling 'turn it down!'
You have to put a market value on what you do.
My part in AC/DC is just adding the color on top.
Blues is a big part of rock and roll. The best rock and roll got its birth in the blues. You hear it in Little Richard and Chuck Berry.
Actually, because I'm so small, when I strike an open A chord I get physically thrown to the left, and when I play an open G chord I go right. That's how hard I play, and that's how a lot of my stage act has come about. I just go where the guitar takes me.
I'm constantly surprised when people say, 'But you haven't changed!' It's like saying, 'You've got a wheel. Now why don't you make it a square?'
I used to run home from school, pick up my guitar, and lock myself in my room and play.
With seven boys and one sister, there was always a lot of music in the house. A few of my brothers were playing instruments, so it was from hearing that, coupled with discovering early rock, which triggered me to pick up a guitar and try to pick out the notes.
A lot of people say, 'AC/DC - that's the band with the little guy who runs around in school shorts!'
The guitar can go at a scream. It can yell at you.
You'd be playing in a pub in the afternoon. Then late at night, you'd be playing a club. You got into that habit: 'If we don't play, we don't eat.'
A good record is one where I can tap my toes. I always say let your feet do the thinking.
The mainstream media tend to lump everything together. To them, there's no difference between Madonna, the Rolling Stones, or whatever.
I honestly believe that you have to be able to play the guitar hard if you want to be able to get the whole spectrum of tones out of it. Since I normally play so hard, when I start picking a bit softer my tone changes completely, and that's really useful sometimes for creating a more laid-back feel.
We played by feel. We felt as though you could put us on any stage, and we would find a way to win that crowd over. We had that attitude: We can't fail. You might not like it right now, but you will.
Soloing was pretty easy for me because it was probably the first thing I've ever done.
I never thought of us as a punk band, a metal band, or a new wave band. Just as a band band.
Over the years, the critics have said, 'They never change.' Maybe the little guy's got a new color of school uniform. I always thought, 'Well, what were we going to change into?' A jazz band? A keyboard band?
When I'm on stage the savage in me is released. It's like going back to being a cave man. It takes me six hours to come down after a show.
When you sign on and say, 'I'm gonna do this and that,' it's always good to say at the end of it, 'I've done all I said I would do.'
There's nothing worse than trying to patch something or make do. If there wasn't something there in the beginning, it won't be there at the end.
Key to longevity... drinking embalming fluid every year.
We always try to get new songs. That's what AC/DC has always been about. You can listen to what we do, and you can go, 'Well, it's AC/DC, but it's a new song.' So that's what we've always tried to achieve. So we've always got that style.
My ambition was just to be able to play guitar.
I've heard people say all our music sounds the same, but it's usually just the people who don't like us who say it.
We're not the prettiest bunch of animals in the world.
I think the '60s was a great time for music, especially for rock and roll. It was the era of The Beatles, of The Stones, and then later on The Who and Zeppelin. But at one point in the '70s, it just kind of became... mellow.
I don't regard myself as a soloist. It's a color; I put it in for excitement. It's not great loss if a solo has to go. We've made songs without solos.
We never go overboard and above people's heads. We strive to retain that energy, that spirit we've always had. We feel the more simple and original something is, the better.
The misunderstanding out there is that we are a 'hard rock' band or a 'heavy metal' band. We've only ever been a rock n' roll band.
I found that pedals were too much to fool around with. You'd be halfway through a solo, and the batteries would go dead and conk out. And if you tread on the lead going to the pedal, something would always go wrong. Or some crazy kid would pull the lead out just at the moment when you're about to do your big number on it.
For the two hours I climb on stage, I become the schoolboy. But as soon as it is over, I get off stage and go home and get told to wipe my feet before I come in.
Go back to the very beginning, when we first started playing in local pubs. We used to play Chuck Berry covers. Every now and then, we'd slip in one of our own songs, and we found that we were getting away with it - nobody seemed to know these were original tracks.
The media, being what it is, is always looking for the next new thing. There are still bands out there playing, no matter what the new thing is. The Stones go out there, and people go see them without records or even airplay.
We just stuck to what we did best. Maybe that's why people plug into us and go 'They never change.' We're reliable. A bit like old shoes.
I always liked the double cutaway. It looked like two horns. It's like a red devil. So I went to the guitar shop, saw an SG that was sitting there looking rather lonely, and said, 'Hey, that's for me.'
I never thought we'd be put into any sort of historical thing. When we started as a band, it was a day-to-day thing. You sort of played a gig, you got your money and thought, 'OK, where's tomorrow's gig?' You never thought you'd get past a summer.
I tried a Les Paul when I was a lot younger. I tried the Les Paul, and because of the weight of the thing, it nearly dislocated my hip.
