AC/DC: Black Ice

Produced by Brendan O'Brien

Released: 2008

In the eight years since the last AC/DC album, the music industry has moved on. Typically, AC/DC has not. Black Ice is as identifiably AC/DC as anything they've done before. Not as high energy perhaps, but with a 61-year old lead singer that probably isn't surprising. The first noticable aspect is that this is an AC/DC album with packaging: there's versions that come in tins and with special full colour-booklets. Even the standard version is a digipak. The last time Akkadakka made any concessions as to how their album was packaged was probably back when For Those About to Rock... came with a gatefold sleeve, but as this group is one of the few remaining major acts that still doesn't allow digital downloads it's obvious they needed to make this CD as alluring as possible. I doubt it would have mattered, as this album sold 1.7 million copies in a week and topped the charts in 29 countries, including Australia where, amazingly, they have only achieved the milestone thrice before. And as with almost everything they've released since 1981, it's unlikely that anyone will still be listening to Black Ice all that much in a year from now.

Clocking in at almost an hour and featuring no less than fifteen songs, Black Ice is a true epic by AC/DC standards and while it is arguably the best album they've made since The Razors Edge it would have been better had they pared it by at least fifteen minutes. "Spoilin' for a Fight", "Wheels", "Smash N Grab" and "Money Made" are simply nothing songs: go nowhere, add nothing, say nothing. Conversely, "Rock N' Roll Train" is one of the best things they've done in a very long time, "Big Jack" has some long-lost swagger to it and "She Likes Rock N Roll" features an unusually funky bass line from Cliff Williams, normally one of the invisible men of rock. "War Machine" also has him laying down a throbbing intro that recalls "Live Wire", although the rest of the song hardly compares.

Far more successfully than Rick Rubin was able, it appears Brendan O'Brien has convinced AC/DC to actually add a trace of colour to their predictable style. For the first time ever, Brian Johnson uses his natural singing voice on "Decibel" instead of his usual tortured shriek and "Stormy May Day" features some truly sloppy slide guitar, two noteworthy moments that add a bit of character to this otherwise by-the-numbers album. The production is otherwise pretty bland. The guitars are suitably loud but not especially gutsy and for a good two-thirds of the album the band just slots into a comfortable bluesy groove. They close out in a rocking fashion with "Rocking All the Way" and the title track, but apart from those couple of interesting touches already mentioned, the middle of Black Ice is little more than a void. There just isn't any of the energy that you'd expect from a band called AC/DC, really and everything between "Anything Goes" and "Rock N Roll Dream" (except "She Likes Rock N Roll", which is really quite good) could have been chopped without anyone noticing.

In just three weeks this has shifted 5 million units around the world so it probably really doesn't matter what I or any other reviewer says about Black Ice. It's AC/DC. You know what to expect.

1. Rock N Roll Train
2. Skies on Fire
3. Big Jack
4. Anything Goes
5. War Machine
6. Smash N Grab
7. Spoilin' for a Fight
8. Wheels
9. Decibel
10. Stormy May Day
11. She Likes Rock N Roll
12. Money Made
13. Rock n Roll Dream
14. Rocking All the Way
15. Black Ice

Rating: 65%