NEW YORK

As might be expected from a band whose middle-aged lead guitarist performs in a schoolboy suit, AC/DC don't take themselves too seriously.

"You've got to have a sense of humor," said the guitarist in question, Angus Young, as he sat with the band's lead singer, Brian Johnson, last month for an interview in New York's Four Seasons Hotel.

The diminutive Young left his school uniform at home that day in favor of a tiny pair of jeans, but his band's irreverent spirit was alive and well as he and Johnson mocked teen pop and joked about the secret behind Johnson's banshee-like vocals. The singer, whose gruff speaking voice bears no resemblance to his famous shrieking, explained that the trick is to "squeeze the testicles and let yourself go."

When it comes to their rock 'n' roll, however, AC/DC are dead serious. Critics and fans are calling the band's new album, Stiff Upper Lip, their best release in years, and Young and Johnson seem well aware that they have come up with something special.

"We've always been very conscious of what quality we come up with. We just don't say we are making a rock 'n' roll album and plunk down any tune," Young said. "With us, it's not just a case of, 'I've got a good riff here.' We might hammer out 30 or 40 riffs."

For Stiff Upper Lip, which has spawned a major rock-radio hit with its title track, the band brought in producer George Young, the older brother of Angus and AC/DC rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young, and a former member of the '60s pop group the Easybeats.

AC/DC established its reputation as a fierce rock outfit with its first U.S. album High Voltage (1976), which was, not coincidentally, also produced by George Young.

The band released four records after that with its first lead singer, Bon Scott, who died of alcoholism after the recording of Highway to Hell (1979). They regrouped the next year for Back in Black, widely considered to be among the greatest hard-rock albums of all time.

Their sound [~] an enormous, Charlie Watts-on-steroids backbeat, artfully intertwined guitars, wailing vocals [~] hasn't changed much since then, a fact they readily acknowledge.

The Interview

SonicNet: What were you guys thinking when you went in and started writing songs for the album? What was the idea?

Angus Young: For me, I just hope it's a good rock 'n' roll album. I wasn't concerned with people saying, 'That doesn't quite fit, there [need to be] a few commercial things on it.' I was more concerned with rock 'n' roll. That's the good thing about us, too: over the years, being who we are, you don't get stuck in any of that muck. When the world was into punk music, we went into guitar-based rock. When they said, 'Now it's disco,' we still kind of went with the rock.

SonicNet: Were you dissatisfied with your last record [Ballbreaker (1995)]?

Young: When we made Ballbreaker, the plan was we wanted to do a stripped-down record, a bit hard and tough. Yet again, I think what was being played [on the radio at the time] was dance things, mostly the disco-type dance. We felt we should get in and do a nice tough rock record, maybe a bit more hard-edged. You can hear it on the Ballbreaker track, you can hear it on "Hail Caesar," and especially "Hard As a Rock."

SonicNet: This time around, rather than hitting maybe quite as hard, were you looking to focus more on the groove?

Young: Yeah, the groove thing was what we wanted, but also just good old rock 'n' roll. Something you could also put on at a party and tap away your feet to. We were looking for each song to be unique in itself.

Brian Johnson: When I first heard the riffs on the new record I knew I was listening to something that in about four or five years' time already would be looked upon as classic riffs. Because as Angus was saying before, and I am just being dead personal here, there was all this music [out there] coming out repetitive. There were different tunes obviously, but there were never any riffs. Everything went to the vocal side of it. It was all catchy choruses. All the riffs were gone from the early days. It seems to be a lost art. [AC/DC's song] "Whole Lotta Rosie," those riffs, why are those songs still dead popular today? It's because the riffs were fantastic. Not just with us [~] some other bands in the early days did some fantastic riffs. Like [the Kinks'] "You Really Got Me" [~] I never forgot it. To me, the art of writing riffs seems to have vanished, [and it has been replaced by] the art of making the next song with a catchy chorus and getting some good-looking guys and girls to sing it and bingo! [~] you've got a hit.

Young: When I think like that, though, there were always a lot of bands going on, like the Osmonds and Jackson 5. I've always viewed that as a TV world. I don't know why, but it just seems that TV has always been clean, safe and conservative. The more smooth, cleaner [~]

Johnson: Boring.

Young: [~] the better. They don't want them to be too excited. From the early '50s, the times of Jerry Lee Lewis, these people were very real, especially in the case of Jerry Lee Lewis. It was that little bit of fear that there was a youth rebellion going on. They've always tended to be nicer and sweeter.

SonicNet: Do you feel that it's especially bad now, with the new rise of teen pop?

Young: It was then, too. I mean you had people like David Cassidy. There will always be someone sweet. It's a bit like this, I suppose: there are all sorts of cute puppy dogs, but it doesn't stop people from going out and buying Dobermans.

SonicNet: I'm curious about bringing George [Young] back to produce. Obviously he was a big influence on you when you were kids.

Young: [laughing] We didn't bring him back. If he wants to do it ...

SonicNet: Did knowing that George, your big brother, who had hits when you were still kids, would be producing these songs, have an effect on the songwriting or the way you worked on it?

Young: George doesn't let anything go when you're working with him. He doesn't come in and say, 'Hey, that's shit,' but he comes in and gives you an honest answer. He still gets you to think that there is more than one way to skin a cat. And that's how he's always been good like that. I love watching him do it sometimes. Just the way he sits there and listens to what you've got. Then he might grab something like a bass or a piano and just hammer away with you. He's a very creative guy.

SonicNet: Was there a sense that you had to get the songs to a really high level before you brought them to him?

Young: Well, you'd like him to sit back and say, 'Yeah,' and let him also get excited with what you've got. Malcolm had said he had a few ideas that were a bit bluesy. George said he could really tell. I was always a big fan of the blues stuff. He picked up it straight away.

SonicNet: You've got "Can't Stand Still," which is essentially a 12-bar blues song, on there. It also has that Chuck Berry, Little Richard feel.

Young: The rock 'n' roll thing. We love that too. It was good because, with us, we don't sit down and try and hammer out something like this. You like to get the idea of a song and it just naturally comes that way. Rather than sitting down and saying, 'I'll rip off an old Little Richard tune or something.'

SonicNet: For you, Brian, you're used to having two brothers in the band. With George there, you've got three brothers. Did you ever feel like an outsider?

Johnson: It doesn't bother me at all. It's great. I like all the lads. I've known them for so long. And George, really, I've known him for just as long as I've known the lads, maybe two years less. I think the first time we ever met him was when we first went to Australia in '81. He came to me and he's just a great lad. You feel dead comfortable with George and it's not just because it's me [~] he makes everybody feel like that. He makes you feel like you're the only one. He's got that great ability. When I went into the studio, he said, 'I just want you to get up there and just enjoy yourself, just sing,' which sounds vague, but it wasn't. It was right at the point, I knew exactly what he meant. He said, 'I'll tell you if it's crap and I'll stop you when it's crap.'

SonicNet: Angus, when you actually do write the songs, is it you and Malcolm sitting together with electric guitars, or is it you alone with an acoustic? How does the process work?

Young: It just depends sometimes. Malcolm might come in and say he's got half a dozen things he's been hammering out. I go away on my end and obtain things. You sit and play with each other and bounce off. There are other times when you might at the spur of a moment walk in and you've got a great idea and you put it down. Other times you may have half an idea and the two of you work on it and try to come up with something.

SonicNet: What are the ingredients for a great AC/DC song?

Young: What are the ingredients? Well I think, first off, for what the style is, you want to be able to sit there and go, 'I want to tap my foot,' number one. And you would certainly like a lot of good strong vocals or angst. In all of our material, even though it might not seem that way, there is a melody. But it's not your stock pretty-boy, pop-tune type melody, or girl-type melody. In some cases if it's sounding too slick we rough it up, we change it. But we do work on it. We don't just say, 'He's gonna do eight bars of verse and 12 bars of this.' We work it out. But I think the number one thing at the end of it, you want to come out sounding like [you've got a] great rock tune, something that can get people's toes tapping, so they can let off a bit of steam.

SonicNet: Brian was saying that the riff was dead. Something else that really seems to be dying is the guitar solo. A lot of young bands don't seem to understand the value of the guitar solo. If there's one thing AC/DC understands, it's certainly that.

Young: If you're in a band that's guitar-based, the highlight and color that you rely on, the two main elements are Brian with the vocals, and the other thing you utilize is guitar. So, if it comes time to do a solo thing, again, you want something that suits the song, but at the same time if it can catch your ear, even better.

Johnson: I was thinking Angus' guitar's like a kid. You got to take it walking. It's gotta go walking someday. [laughter]

Young: It's always ready to escape.

Johnson: Who's playing who, you know? [laughter]

SonicNet: Brian, listening to you sing over the years, one question that has to be asked is, does it take a physical toll on you, on your throat, in any way?

Johnson: Nah. You just got to be fit, there's no big secret, it's not hard. You just got to be inspired. Be fit enough to get up and do it. I'll do it as long as I can, but it's no big secret. Just get up and just belt it out. Anybody can do it if they want to.

Young: Well, look at the build on you.

Johnson: Look at that! Built like a ship's captain!

Young: Look at the skinny little one next to him.

Johnson: If you want to do it you can do it. It's easy to sing the wimpy bits. It took me a couple years [when I] first started singing in rock bands to do it. Then all of a sudden one day you just let it go. Squeeze the testicles and let yourself go. [laughter]

SonicNet: That's the secret, huh?

Johnson: Yeah.

SonicNet: On this album you do use a deeper voice on the title track's first verse.

Johnson: Oh, that's not me. [laughs] That's just a bit of fun at the start, just a different way of interpreting this lovely mischievous fella, which was created in the song. You know, I went out on a drive, on a bit of a trip. That's just this lovely little evil fellow.

Young: And the idea [was] a calm before the storm. So when the whole bang came in it's like a hurricane. And also George said it would be good too, he had heard Brian sing, just sitting around, in a different register. He said, 'Try it.' Because it sounds cool, it's a bit like Humphrey Bogart.

Johnson: Humphrey Bogart with a sore throat. [laughter]

Young: Before the gun comes in.

Johnson: That's a good analogy, that is.

SonicNet: "Can't Stop Rock 'N' Roll" follows a long tradition of AC/DC songs with rock 'n' roll in the title.

Young: We plagiarize ourselves.

SonicNet: Was that just a fun song, or were you thinking of someone or something who is trying to stop rock 'n' roll?

Young: No, I don't think there is someone physically trying to stop it, I mean, that's impossible.

SonicNet: Well, culturally?

Young: Even culturally, it doesn't matter, you can't stop it. If you look in the world, every now and again there are purges, like in America, the purges of tobacco. The more that you purge things, the more they seem to come back and bite you on the behind.

If You Want AC/DC (You've Got It)