And so, for one last time with everything turned up to 11. AC/DC ’s ability to forge their hard-rock voyage through any and all circumstances knows no limits. In the last 50 years they have faced deaths, legal troubles, line-up changes, commercial dips, the passage of time, and the message is always the same: let there be rock.
“Let’s pick up where we left off and play some rock’n’roll ,” ever amiable frontman Brian Johnson said after opener “If You Want Blood (You’ve Got It)”, as if any other outcome were possible. It felt like a nod, also, to the fact that he was replaced by Axl Rose midway through the band’s last tour in 2016 due to hearing loss, which surgery has repaired. Knowing exactly what to expect from AC/DC is key to their appeal: much like Jeremy Corbyn’s political views, this sound – huge riffs, wild guitar solos – was set in stone in 1973.
Like most mega rock acts of their vintage, they are as much brand as band, with everyone at Wembley kitted out in AC/DC T-shirts, crop-tops, caps and devil horns that light up (yours for £20 a pop). And so too their show was reliably hardwired and professional. Minus the theatrics of yore – save for some actual fire for a raucous “Highway to Hell” and, an old trick, a huge church bell that lowered before a cacophonous “Hells Bells” – all eyes were on the stage, particularly on guitarist Angus Young.
He remains as Angus-like as ever: slower at 69 with long, thinning grey hair, he nonethele.
