Customer Reviews

AC/DC: Plug Me In

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4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Being an absolutely HUGE AC/DC fan, this was quite a treat for myself... Family Jewels was so so... and I've had several concert videos on VHS, but this was just such a great release for the fans, probably since the Bonfire Box. Two DVD's, one dedicated dedicated to each of the both phenomenal vocalists, being that I'm impartial to either singer (RIP Bon), Both DVD's are just great to throw on, hook up the audio cables to the Hi-Fi and let'er rip... The audio and video quality are both great, spanning the decades of Rock, All you whiny audiophiles out there who have to have HD tv and dolby 5.1 and all that jazz need to suck it up and crank up the good ol' fashioned VOLUME knob!!! Highly recommended purchase for fans!!

As good as Family Jewels was, this reasonably-priced 2 DVD set contains tons more raw and rare concert footage and even includes some great interviews with the band as well. As usual, each of the discs are devoted to the Bon and Brian era respectively.

Of course, the band are cashing in on their glory days with these releases but they breathe new life into songs with never before seen material for the most part. So, it's hardly just a nostalgia trip for fans like myself who know the albums by heart.

Recommended!

Columbia Records will release "Plug Me In" -- the
ultimate career-spanning DVD box set of live
performances, interviews and more from AC/DC, the
world's most electrifying rock and roll band -- on
Tuesday, October 16.

The first AC/DC release since the band came to
Columbia Records earlier this year, the AC/DC "Plug Me
In" DVD collection brings together for the very first
time an astonishing five hours of definitive live
concert and television performances -- many of them
previously unavailable -- chronicling the ongoing
career (now in its fourth decade!) of a groundbreaking
rock and roll powerhouse whose music transcends the
test of time.

"AC/DC has delivered the most dynamic rock and roll
music in the world," said Steve Barnett, Chairman,
Columbia Records. "Columbia is honored to be releasing
this definitive career-spanning retrospective
featuring many of AC/DC's finest filmed performances. "

Disc One of the AC/DC "Plug Me In" DVD collection
begins with a performance of "High Voltage" performed
in October 1975 on Australia's "King of Pop" awards
show. The first disc of "Plug Me In" is devoted to the
band's formative years (1975-1979) with the late Bon
Scott capturing the group in its full early glory with
more than 20 performances including rare
black-and-white video footage of the notorious St.
Albans High School concert on March 3, 1976; the very
first UK television appearance in July 1976; pristine
live full-color stereo concert performances from
Glasgow and Essex University in 1978; and three songs
-- including the very first public performance of
"Highway To Hell" -- from Netherlands television in
1979. Bonus material on Disc One includes a Bon Scott
interview from November 1977; extraordinary band
interviews from 1976; and four songs recorded live in
Nice on December 15, 1979, one of Bon Scott's last
concerts with the band before his tragic death on
February 19, 1980.

Disc Two of the AC/DC "Plug Me In" DVD collection
covers the band's second great epoch: the Brian
Johnson era which began with the release of "Back In
Black" in 1980 and continues to this day. In addition
to more than 20 performances drawn from three decades
of concerts around the world -- including an extremely
rare Japanese television appearance from February
1981, blistering '80s and '90s sets from Detroit to
Moscow, incredible footage from 1996's "Ballbreaker"
tour (including the "Beavis & Butthead" intro), and
21st century barnburners in Paris, Munich, and Toronto
-- "Plug Me In" includes a fantastic array of bonus
material including the AC/DC Donnington interview on
the "Old Grey Whistle Test" (August 1984) and AC/DC's
in-concert performance of "Rock Me Baby" with THE
ROLLING STONES.

A deluxe collector's edition of "Plug Me In" --
containing a third DVD of 21 additional rare
performances spanning both the Bon Scott and Brian
Johnson eras as well as a treasure trove of facsimile
reproductions of authentic AC/DC memorabilia -- will
also be available for a limited time beginning
Tuesday, October 16.

AC/DC "Plug Me In" track listing:

DVD 1 (2 hours 22 mins):

01. High Voltage (King Of Pop awards) - October 1975
(4:02)
02. It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock 'N'
Roll) (Bandstand) (4:41)
03. School Days (St Albans) - March 1976 (5:40)
04. TNT (St Albans) - March 1976 (4:46)
05. Live Wire (Rollin Bolan) - July 1976 (6:12)
06. Can I Sit Next To You Girl (Rollin Bolan) - July
1976 (4:14)
07. Baby Please Don't Go (Melbourne) - December 1976
(11:49)
08. Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be (Sight & Sound) -
October 1977 (5:13)
09. Rocker (Sight and Sound) - October 1977 (8:10)
10. Rock 'n Roll Damnation (Apollo) - April 1978
(3:44)
11. Dog Eat Dog (Apollo Glasgow) - April 1978 (4:26)
12. Let There Be Rock (Apollo) - April 1978 (8:27)
13. Problem Child (Rock Goes To College) - October
1978 (4:44)
14. Sin City (Rock Goes To College) - October 1978
(5:23)
15. Bad Boy Boogie (Rock Goes To College) -
October1978 (9:06)
16. Highway To Hell (Veronika) - July 1979 (4:12)
17. The Jack (Veronika) - July 1979 (5:19)
18. Whole Lotta Rosie (Veronika) - July 1979 (5:19)

DVD 1 Bonus Footage:

* Band Interview at Airport 1976 (2:16)
* Band Interview at Covent Garden (2:27)
* "Problem Child" - Melbourne (3:56)
* "Baby Please Don't Go" (Germany, incomplete) (2:10)
* "Dirty Deeds" on Network Sounds (0:40)
* Bon Scott Interview (15:11)
* "Rock n' Roll Damnation" - Top of the Pops (2:47)
* Australian Music to the World interview in Atlanta
(1:31)
* Nice Super 8 movie (3.34

AC/ DVD 2 (2 hours 30 minutes):

01. Shot Down In Flames (Tokyo) - February 1981 (3:27)

02. What Do You Do For The Money - (Tokyo) - February
1981 (2:38)
03. Shook Me All Night - February 1981 (4:55)
04. Let There Be Rock (Tokyo) - February 1981 (5:29)
05. Back In Black (Largo 81) - December 1981 (3:34)
06. TNT (Largo 81) (3:39)
07. Shoot To Thrill (Houston) - October 1983 (5:23)
08. Guns For Hire (Detroit) - November 1983 (5:24)
09. Dirty Deeds (Detroit) - November 1983 (4:12)
10. Flick Of The Switch (Largo 83) (3:27)
11. Bedlam In Belgium (Largo 83) (3:24)
12. Back In Black (USSR) - September 1991 (2:15)
13. Highway To Hell (USSR) - September 1991 (3:36)
14. Whole Lotta Rosie (USSR) - September 1991 (4:16)
15. For Those About To Rock (USSR) - September 1991
(6:52)
16. Gone Shooting (VH1 Session) - July 1996 (6:03)
17. Hail Caesar (Sydney Screen Mix) - 1996 Tour (5:43)

18. Ballbreaker (Sydney Screen Mix) - 1996 Tour (4:29)

19. Rock N Roll Ain't Noise Pollution (Sydney Screen
Mix) - Tour 1996 (6:34)
20. Hard As a Rock (Stade De France) - June 2001
(5:02)
21. Hells Bells (Stade De France) - June 2001 (5:49)
22. Ride On (Stade De France) - June 2001 (6:27)
23. Stiff Upper Lip (Munich) - June 2003 (3:54)
24. Thunderstruck (Munich) - June 2003 (5:24)
25. If You Want Blood (Toronto) - July 2003 (5:35)
26. The Jack (Toronto) - July 2003 (9:50)
27. You Shook Me All Night (Toronto) - July 2003
(4:27)

DVD 2 Bonus Footage:

* Beavis and Butthead intro to Ballbreaker tour (1:16)

* "Hells Bells" in Brussells (3:40)
* Donnington BBC interview with Angus (1:03)
* Warmup for VH1 (4:20)
* "Rock Me Baby" - Jam with THE ROLLING STONES (6:43)

DVD 3 (Bonus DVD) (2 hours 7 minutes):

01. Girl's Got Rhythm (Australian TV) - 1979 (3:30)
02. She's Got Balls (St. Albans High School 76) (6:20)

03. Long Way To the Top (St Albans High School 76)
(7:08)
04. Let There Be Rock (BBC Sight & Sound 77) (5:57)
05. Bad Boy Boogie (Apollo Glasgow 78) (7:49)
06. House Is On Fire (Detroit 83) (3:06)
07. Guns For Hire (Band rehearsals 84) (3:50)
08. Boogey Man (Sydney 96) (10:49)
09. Girl's Got Rhythm (Sydney 96) (4:08)
10. Highway to Hell (Dublin 1996) (7:01)
11. Let There Be Rock (Stuttgart 2000) (10:55)
12. Angus Statue Intro (Stiff Upper Lip Tour Film
2001) (1:26)

Live at Houston Summit 83 (Whole Concert segment runs
53 minutes):

01. Guns For Hire (5:31)
02. Shoot To Thrill (5:32)
03. Sin City (5:24)
04. House Is On Fire (3:58)
05. Back In Black (4:12)
06. Bad Boy Boogie (14:33)
07. Rock 'n Roll Ain't Noise Pollution (5:07)
08. Flick Of The Switch (3:25)
09. Hells Bells (5:24)

The AC/DC "Plug Me In" DVD box set is both a Holy
Grail for aficionados of AC/DC as well as an ideal and
comprehensive introduction to the music and history of
a pioneering band that continues to define the
electrifying possibilities of rock and roll.

Formed in Sydney, Australia in 1973 by brothers Angus
and Malcolm Young (still the most formidable electric
guitar team in rock), AC/DC released its first album,
"High Voltage", in 1975. The group has gone on to sell
nearly 70 million albums in the U.S. alone, making
AC/DC one of the five best-selling bands in American
music history. The "Back In Black" album has achieved
RIAA double diamond status, for sales in excess of 21
million copies in the United States, and is the U.S.'s
fifth largest-selling album ever.

AC/DC was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
in 2003.

This DVD is GREAT fun! If you are an AC/DC fan, this needs to be a part of your music library. I especially loved the old footage of a very young Bon Scott and Angus Young! The mind's image of Bon Scott in a dress and pigtails is rather repulsive, but when you actually see it, it's very funny.

I read the reviews below which panned this offering because it didn't have Dolby sound. Well, I'm not a sound expert, so I can't tell you whether it does or doesn't have Dolby sound, but I can tell you that it sounds GREAT to ME. That's all I care about! Besides, if you look at all the reviews that have been posted on Amazon by the others who have whined about the sound on this DVD, you will see that the vast majority of them are negative reviews. Seems like some people just enjoy looking for anything to complain about and when they find it, they have a field day.

I do understand that sound is much more important with music DVDs than regular movies (to me, anyway). I get that. The fact is, though, that unless you are a sound expert, or someone who can hear a pin drop 50 feet away, then this DVD sounds just fine. Great, in fact! I give it five stars. No, it's not perfect, but then, nothing is. The five star rating is because I don't know how to give it four-and-a-half. AC/DC fans, get this DVD today!!

Peace.

As a huge Bon Scott fan I just love this DVD!!!
Put together extremely well it shows live footage, interviews and a scrapbook! Sadly at the end of the scrapbook you see the anouncement of
Bon's Death! Bon was it when I was growing up in the seventies!
The ultimate Frontman in my book! The DVD continues with Brian whom I have a lot of Respect for. This DVD is a must have for any AC/DC Fan!!!

I never knew I liked AC/DC until a couple of years ago. I'd somehow written them off as cliche, as "You Shook Me All Night Long" and "Back In Black" have just been too over-played on rock radio. But there are reasons why bands remain as popular as AC/DC as long as they have been - it's because they're good! It's because they're very VERY good!! I gave the masterful guitar work of Angus and Malcolm Young (they're an inseparable team) another listen, gained a new appreciation of the whiskey voice of Bon Scott and his astounding anthem "Let There Be Rock" (just one among sooooo many), and fell in love with "For Those About To Rock (We Salute You)", along with all of those other Brian Johnson-era masterpieces.

And then I saw this DVD compilation. Wow!! For those who like rock `n' roll, until you actually see AC/DC in action, you really ain't seen nothing yet. I can't believe I've lived 42 years without beholding the magnificence that is this amazing powerhouse of a band. Most people would wonder what planet I've been on, as millions have been to this band's shows (this DVD is testament to that) but now my eyes are open!!! And this is only the 2-DVD set, there's also a 3-DVD version of Plug Me In.

The first DVD is one hour and 46 minutes long and has 18 live and TV appearances of the band with Bon Scott from 1975 to 1979, with nine bonus features that runs 37 minutes long, with TV interviews, live shows and other goodies. The second DVD is two hours and 12 minutes long and has 27 live tracks from the Brian Johnson era, from 1981 to 2003; there are only 17 minutes of bonus material on this disc, five items including a Beavis and Butthead and AC/DC cartoon, some interviews, and a clip of Angus and Malcolm playing with the Rolling Stones in Germany in 2003. The menus and sub-menus have a weird Space Invaders arcade game theme to them, and you get to see Angus duck walking below the barriers shooting at the Space Invaders. Groovy. There are also two booklets that match the DVD themes of a Bon disc and a Brian disc. The first one has a few pics, but it is mainly song credits and a David Fricke essay; the second one is jammed with photos, including a great one of Angus and Keith with contrasting Gibson Casinos (Angus' is red, to contrast his black shirt, Keith's is black, to contrast his red shirt).

Funnily enough, while this collection has all the appearances of being a career retrospective, combining videos from the Bon Scott era (1975-1979) and the Brian Johnson era (1981-2003), it misses a lot of important band history. First of all, Angus and Malcolm Young's older brother George had already enjoyed a bit of an international career with his band the Easybeats when they released the hit "Friday On My Mind" in 1966 that's not mentioned anywhere, despite George being an important part of the band's production. Then there was the period with their first singer Dave Evans when not just Angus but the whole band had character costumes of their own (check out the AC/DC dice logo on the bass drum in this video). Finally, the "retrospective" seems to conveniently forget about some of the footage that exists that shows Angus in his "Super Ang" costume, and only shows his schoolboy gear. It also doesn't show Brian Johnson in any of his pre-AC/DC incarnations, such as with his awesome UK rock group Geordie. Rock `n' roll!!

(For the completist, there are plenty of other nuggets to dig up, which I took an interest in finding some of them after seeing this - there's Bon Scott singing for the Spektors, as a backup singer for the Valentines [check out those awful outfits... and the guitarist's Gibson SG!!!] The Valentines also did a very nice Coca Cola jingle. Then there's also a bearded flute- and bassoon-playing hippy Bon playing spooky prog rock in Fraternity [once again... a Gibson SG!!!!], before finding his rock `n' roll destiny with Acca Dacca).

But hey, who's complaining - there's over five hours of great archival video footage on this, plus some cool extras. Disc one's 18 songs shows the band coming of age and "maturing" (this is AC/DC, they can only mature so much), and as the years progress you see the band playing bigger and bigger venues (the Brian Johnson disc pretty much only has them playing huge venues). What strikes me is the energy of the band, and also the same-ness - Angus always bops in the same way, he always does something goofy (a striptease, running into the audience to play a solo, jumping from the amps at the end of a song), and Malcolm always stays in a wobbly hunched position, while Phil Rudd doesn't gain an ounce from 1976 to 2003 (neither do Malcolm or Angus, more or less), and his gummy jaw action as he plays is really quite... weird. Aside from the beginning of their career, when they were experimenting with their stage duds, they hardly ever vary their clothes either (how many years has Brian Johnson been wearing that cap anyway, for example?).

I also seriously wonder what's in the schoolboy's bag that Angus used to have at his back at all times onstage.

The first video on disc one is from October 1975, from TV Week's King of Pop awards, and the band is playing for a TV audience. The first image is of Angus' guitar, then Malcolm's guitar, and the we see Bon in a... tuxedo and bowtie! The song is, of course, "High Voltage." The audience is a bunch of well-dressed white young Australians. One of them bares his chest for Bon when he gets near. Bon has a bit of trouble with his mic cable as it snarls his legs. Malcolm looks tasty in white pants with a red sweater, red guitar and red knee-high boots! Bon is on fire, loving the audience. At the side, the orchestra waits for the next numbers. Bon doffs his tuxedo jacket. Angus is such a wee fellow, his legs so skinny in his knee-high socks. Angus soloing on his knees in front of Bon, like David Bowie and Mick Ronson (almost). Wow! "It's a long way to the top if you wanna rock `n' roll" has the band playing for a studio audience of a lot of boogying teens, Bon in a Superman t-shirt with his bagpipes at the ready. The Seventies Austrlian teens are cute, but the fluorescent and lime green summer dresses are pretty weird. One skinny hot chick wears a tank top that says "Rome" in what looks like AC/DC font! Bon really wrings it out in the bagpipe solo. Cameras are on Bon, drummer Phil Rudd and bass player Mark Evans, but none are on Angus! Bon's lookin' mighty tasty in those jeans. The TV show announcer comes out all perky... and it goes to a black and white clip from a show at High School Hall in St Albans for two songs - "School Days" (which is a ripoff of Chuck Berry's "Hail Hail Rock `n' Roll) and "TNT". The hall is packed, and the crowd engagement is fantastic. Bon is a master of ceremonies, and he and Angus look great in matching striped shirts (Angus is without his schoolboy garb for once). The show is very much like what you'd get these days from someone's mobile phone, it's rough and raw and when one girl hoists a big ANGUS banner towards the stage, you see it from the back! Plenty of shots are of Bon's fore-arm, or his stomach. Pretty basic screwy setup. Angus looks like a little boy. The song goes into crowd call-and-response mode, and everyone goes crazy. Maybe the last time they played a small venue. July 13th, 1976, they played on "Super Pop/Rollin' Bolan", Bon shirtless but wearing a collared leopard vest with tails (?!!?!!). He loses the tails midway, and the band rocks into "Live Wire". Mean and nasty sex via a microphone. "If you're looking for satisfaction/ I'm satisfaction guaranteed." Great Orang amps onstage!!! Cool song - Angus barely plays throughout the first half, it's all Malcolm's rhythm guitar. Angus' schoolboy uniform looks like crushed velvet!! Great drownout and Angust spazzzz at the end, with full squeal and hop. That's followed in the same set with "Can I Sit Next To You Girl", and Bon is all sweaty pecs and abs, Angus in full bluesy stomp - this is one of their oldest songs and they know it well. Bon is pure horniness as he says "Can I sit next to you - YOU SMELL NICE!" Seems like an innocent question/statement... but it definitely isn't. The December 26th 1976 show at the Sydney Myer Music Bowl in Melbourn, Australia is a real treat - it's a hellacious (albeit blurry) version of "Baby Please Don't Go" that never ever stops... except for an interlude when Angus comes out and does a bit of a striptease... he takes off his striped shirt, walks around the huge stage shirtless, takes his shorts down, walks around in his bikini briefs, does a bit of a moon (with some assistance from Bon), we see his skinny white butt, he suggests showing off the other side, then shuffles off to put on his shorts, and Bon comes back out... vocal thunder for the ladies in the front row, and some wicked soloing, and a rare word from Angus: "come on, let's hear ya, let's hear ya, c'mon - play me, c'mon." The song has the disc's first real guitar spazz-out with real floor-shredding madness, with Angus in his shorts stalking the stage on his scabby knees and shredding around in crazy pinwheels. Really nutso!!! (Don't you dare compare it to the version they do with Bon Scott dressed as a school girl... that is, a school girl to Angus' schoolboy). The next two tracks are from Sight And Sound, recorded in London, the first one, "Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be" on October 29th 1977 seems to have come up by accident, as it seems from the intro by host Peter Drummond.

Hello, and welcome to Radio 1 Sight and Sound in concert. Tonight, you may have seen in your Radio Times we were billed to have the sensational Alex Harvey Band. Well, you may or may not know that a couple of days ago, Alex Harvey decided to retire from the world of rock `n' roll, which I think is a great tragedy, and I hope it isn't going to be a permanent thing, but anyway he's decided that, so unfortunately we can't have him on tonight. But in the meantime, let me introduce to you a band that has recently released a brand new album called `Let There Be Rock', and that's the title of their single as well. And they're going to rock and roll for us right now. (sound of feedback coming from onstage) Hehh.. I don't know if that's part of the sound, but would you welcome please - AC/DC!!

So... who's Alex Harvey? (Well, whoever he was, his guitarist played a Gibson SG!) The show is, of course, totally awesome. An unruly Angus comes out with his schoolboys clothes asunder, a wild-eyed Bon has his hairy chest and his denim vest and his big balls tight jeans in full locomotion. That's followed by "Rocker", which has Bon shirtless now and Angus in just his shirt (no jacket or bag). These guys go nutso! Bon is a rival for Robert Plant at this point. "Boogie woogie!" A grinning Bon winks drunkenly at the camera as Angus walks up into the audience (and the camera pans across all the '70s polyester and bad mustaches), Angus rubs hips with one woman, there's an Angus imposter in the audience that he goes to hang out with, then he steps dangerously up on the balcony (this guy has no fear of heights) before running back around and then going back onstage. Then he's back spazzing on the main stage. Angus gives it another nutty onstage spinout, fighting and kicking, down on his knees and flailing like a nutbar. April 30th, 1978 they are in Glasgow at the Apollo doing "Rock `n' Roll Damnation", great big giant stage action. Angus' schoolboy cap has a big red circle on it - why? Bon has a nice mullet. "Dog Eat Dog" is nice, but nothing beats a full-on smoking version of "Let There Be Rock", probably one of the greatest rock `n' roll songs ever written. Little Angus, at the end of the song, does a great crowd-raising solo from on top of a Marshal amp, and then... jumps off of it, and then falls on hit ass for a spazz-out, not once but twice! SMASH!!!!! This is as pure rock `n' roll as it gets. In the "Rock Goes To College" songs played on October 28th, 1978 at the University of Essex in the UK, the band plays three songs, starting with "Problem Child". Peter Drummond introduces it again:

Hello and welcome to Rock Goes To College. This week we come from the University of Essex in Colchester. We've got a band that's pretty powerful, as you've just heard. They are, of course, AC/DC, who've just completed a four-week tour of North America, which went very well for them, they're just about to start, a tour of...

The band cuts him off, with Bon's "Thank you Peter", before jumping rabidly into"I'm hot, and when I'm not - I'm cold as ice." The crowd goes wild. Bon's got white socks on. Kids in the audience look like Harry Potter. "Sin City" is a nut buster, with Angus falling on the ground, the band picks up, and moves quickly into a stompin' "Bad Boy Boogie". AC/DC!!!!!!!!!!! The whole crowd is bopping at this point, amazing. Angus starts the song off soft, then hard, then he solos spinning on the floor. Check out the scabby knees! Midway in the song in the small Colchester club Angus starts to strut around, takes off his jacket, his bag, removes his shirt, rubs it over his body, hangs it on a mic stand, and carries on with the guitar shenanigans, a bit of mellow blues, then some massive stomp. The next show is in Arnhem at a festival, where some weird Dutchman comes out an introduces the band. Bon say "Hey, you're on TV now, so I want you all to smile," slurring his words a bit. Angus' hair is very long now, he looks like a shaggy seven-year-old tomboy as he jumps into a rough, fairly regular version of "Highway to Hell." The band's swampy rendition of "The Jack" is sweet and nasty. Malcolm Young and Mark Evans stroll up to the mics to sing "she's got the Jack", and then robotically return to their spots at the back of the stage. Weird how three of the members of the band are like sidemen, while Angus and Bon tear it up with their theatrics, total contrast. The audience sings the whole chorus the second time around. Angus' solo is pure blues. Love his powder blue socks. "Whole Lotta Rosie" stomps along the same stage, and the disc ends.

Disc 2 opens with five songs from a February 1981 show in Tokyo, and Angus' hair is longer than ever. Brian Johnson doesn't wear his trademark cap, and he's looking pretty chubby in his red t-shirt. A show in Maryland is a lot of fun, the stage is wide and the lights are bright. "TNT" is interesting, because you hear how the two guitars interact - Malcolm starts off the song, Angus just struts around the stage, but when he comes in you hear it clear as a bell: the two guitars sound very different. While many of the clips are pretty standard and show the workmanlike band rocking out but without any flourishes of interest, the November 17th 1983 Detroit show is a bit more interesting as it includes backstage footage of the band jamming on some blues, having drinks and smokes, with some shots outside the Joe Louis Arena (where they played with Fastway) before getting into "Guns For Hire". Angus starts it off with some crazy guitar soloing audience call and response, the dark audience is a sea of cigarette lighters, he jumps off a huge amp, and the band kicks into the song. Very nice. One of the main points of interest on the second disc is the September 28th 1991 show in Moscow, which took place one month after a failed KGB coup on Boris Yeltsin's government with tanks laying siege to parliament. The clip starts off with interviews with young Russians, who mourn those killed in the resistance. AC/DC are not political, and it was all a matter of coincidence timing their show around these events, but it's still exciting for the band, and Angus has a few thoughts:

It's strange being here, so close to the time, you have to admire anyone who puts up a battle for what they want. It allows things like this to go on, where they get to see rock music, and they're entitled to that freedom as much as anyone else in the world. To the youth, you've certainly got to take your cap off to them for making a stand. It shows in them great courage that they stood up. It's like any country in the world, rock music is a bonding, it's something that they can share with their friends. You see the kids today at this show, and they're going to become one big voice.

The disc shows four songs from that festival, and the band rocks the place. Great audience shots of guys in Soviet era official green uniforms with the little pins on them and special official-looking brimmed hats. Chris Slade, a big bald guy, is the band's drummer as Phil Rudd had been temporarily evicted from the seat around this time (considered by many as the band's major creative lull, incidentally). Great shot of a backlit Brian Johnson who looks like he's got steam coming off of him. It must have been a great show, and I do know one person who was there - my band's drummer Val. When they launch into "Whole Lotta Rosie" you get to see the big ole Rosie inflatable figure going up behind the stage - crass as hell. And when the last power chord of the song rips out, they pull the plug and the whole thing deflates. Brian Johnson has a few words about the Moscow show:

Four weeks ago we were in London, watching events on television, and we saw these bad things happening, and all of a sudden this wonderful thing happened. People had just had enough, it's a new beginning for rock `n' roll and for the Soviets.

The song goes into "For Those About To Rock (We Salute You)" with a video collage of Russian AC/DC fans partying and flashing the devil horns. Guards flashing peace signs. One uniformed guard, though, puts his hand against the camera, but not everybody's that uptight - you can't stop rock `n' roll. Nice to see the AC/DC logo painted across a USSR flag. Fireworks go off at the end of the song instead of cannon fire, awesome. Unfortunately, for the whole song, you always get the feeling that choice bits have been edited in from all parts of the concert into the flow, so you never know if you're seeing what's being played at the moment. But hey - it's all good. Next up, the "Gone Shooting" bit is done in the VH1 studio in London, the band works out the song, lots of shots of Phil Rudd hitting the drums as his gummy mouth jaws wordlessly with the beat. Malcolm's hair is long again, and somehow it's nice to see the band playing in an intimate setting, not some giant festival stage somewhere, and Brian Johnson sort of has this cool, loose shuffle as he sings along. For "Hail Caesar" they show the band in Sydney, and deliver a little video clip of a Roman centurion riding up and giving a Hail Caesar - he takes off his helmet and we see it's Angus, ha ha. There are other clips where Angus is edited in to a clip from a Rudolph Valentino movie, a news clip of Boris Yeltsin and Bill Clinton, Spartacus, Margaret Thatcher and Dennis at 10 Downing Street, a clip of Thatcher and Reagan taking an oath with their hands over their hearts, or him duckwalking through old monster movies. "Ball Breaker" has Brian Johnson swinging from a wrecking ball hung over the stage, singing away (looks exhausting). Phil Rudd has a smoke as he works the drums, gumming away as always. "Rock `n' Roll Ain't Noise Pollution" is okay, and the ultra-crass crotch-gripping "Hard as a Rock" is just that (although we get something special here - Angus croaking "Harder than a rock" into Brian Johnson's mic during a lull...). Then, for "Hell's Bells", Johnson takes a running jump at a big bell chord hanging above the stage, and the bell chimes in to open the song. But then, suddenly, for "Ride On", four of the five guys in the band appear wearing Adidas sports jerseys. WTF? "Thunderstruck" is good fun, and then the collection goes into the final three songs, which were performed in Toronto on July 30th, 2003 Rocks For Toronto event to a crowd of 500,000 on a programme with The Rolling Stones, Rush, The Guess Who and tons of other bands. "If You Want Blood, You Got It" is a great savage rocker. "The Jack" doesn't go off as well, given the demure Canadian crowd that probably doesn't really appreciate such an explicitly macho song, and Brian Johnson tries to get the audience to sing along... and then Angus does his little striptease ting too. With the pantomime hand motions and all that. Of course his boxers have a giant Canadian flag. He jumps into a beautiful bluesy solo, and off it goes. "You Shook Me All Night Long" has a new lyric ("knockin' me out with those Canadian thighs"), and there are some disturbing shots of the shirtless `n' sweaty fat man pit, but also some nice pics of pretty girls in the audience sitting on their boyfriends' shoulders, swooning to this romantic ballad of a rock `n' roller to a groupie he actually stuck around the whole night with!

The discs come with some cool bonus material. Disc 1, the Bon Scott disc, starts off with an interview with the band at Sydney airport in April 1976 to talk about releases and singles, but the interviewer also asks whose idea it was to put bagpipes in "It's A Long Way to the Top" - George Young's. Angus speaks/slurs! Then a July interview in London, Angus is in his striped shirt, Bon is wearing cutoff jeans and a black belt (and nothing else, really). Bon says that they're better than the Stones and the Beatles. "Who needs them, they're last year's model." The interviewer asks if they're rich, he says "if you poms learned to pay people, we'd get rich real quick." Wow, the band looks so fresh-faced. "Keep your eyes open for words and images and pictures and ideas," some good songwriting advice. Eating a banana. "I think it's time we stopped this endless chatter," says the interviewer. The band run into a "saloon bar" to illustrate their song "Jailbreak", ha ha ha... A grainy version of "Baby Please Don't Go" from Germany in September 1976, Angus does another strip tease (has a bit of trouble getting out of his shirt). Another grainy ill-lit view of "Problem Child" from Melbourne in December 1976. They do a radio promo on video (?!?) for "Dirty Deeds (Done Dirt Cheap)", and then there's the November 1st 1977 interview on Count Down. It's a serious interview about touring in the US and the UK, Bon sipping from a drink the whole time, lots of takes it seems. Talks about AC/DC as a punk/new wave band, the interviewer natters on with a long question. Bon natters on with a long answer.

Aw, we're pulling bigger crowds than they are. I mean, we've got our following here, it's not new wave and it's not punk, it's people who like our band. We honestly thought that punk and the new wave thing might spoil it a bit for us, but it hasn't at all. It was a big fad for a while, like everything else, and there are some who are still hanging on to it, but the main thing about it is it gave rock music a real kick in the gut. And even though we started the whole thing over here - we played here before the Sex Pistols were even thought of - we've always been here, and people are beginning to realise that they want more than just someone up there screaming [affects Johnny Rotten voice] "anarchy and rape" and some sort of crap; and we're it, we're doing it right.

History had perceived punk rock a bit differently, but I guess in 1977 things were only just taking shape. Bon talks about singles bands that don't tour much and their fates. Talks about recording in Australia and going home and enjoying holidays (sad - the band is well known for retreating to the Caribbean to record Back in Black as Bon's epitaph album). He talks about his America tour:

We're going back there in a couple of weeks to tour with Kiss, supporting Kiss, and to play with a band called Rush you might not have heard of out there [doltish interviewer agrees - he's never heard of Rush]. We're doing 12 dates with those bands, and a few of our own, and some co-headlining with a band called UFO. The guy that... what's his name, tell me the bass player from Kiss... he's a popular guy. He came along to one of our shows in the Whiskey in Hollywood to see us play, he came up to us and said "I dig your band, and we're touring in December and we'd like you to tour with us." And they play to 80,000 people, so the show should be amazing.

Funny how neither Bon nor the doltish interviewer could remember the nane "Gene Simmons". Then there's the Top of the Pops clip from June 8th, 1978, where they follow Guy Marks and "Loving You Has Made Me Bananas", to play "Rock `n' Roll Damnation", all the members looking polished in nice shirts... and then there's Angus. Of course it's all lip-synched. Boney M follows AC/DC. Then there's a short documentary that hypes the band's overseas success overseas. Angus Young and Bon Scott talks about how they're the only band that's playing rock `n' roll. The band is up and talking about all of their great riffs and ideas. Bon gives his sad last words: "It's gonna get better and better. I can't see an end to it. It's like infinity rock `n' roll." the last clip is taken from someone's Super 8 footage, showing Angus with his devil horns cap. It cuts in and out, since the camera holder's available film was limited, but it shows parts of "Sin City"," Highway to Hell" and a few other tunes.

Disc 2 has only 17 minutes of bonus material, and it starts out with something from the Beavis and Butthead show, which was an intro to the Ballbreaker tour. The clip shows Beavis and Butthead hanging out at the AC/DC backstage door and try to pick up the groupies that are passing through. Of course they get frustrated and they demand chicks. Angus opens the door for them and passes a dominatrix with a power drill their way. Then there's a January 21st 1981 interview with Brian and Angus. They talk about how to do a show of old Bon Scott songs with new Brian Johnson songs. At least he's still got a "good set of knees" Angus jokes. Brian talks about "when the boys first telephoned us and asked us to come down to have a sing with them and we got through all that and asked us to join the boys, I said yes immediately." I don't really get the "royal we" thing, but hey - it's cool. There's some interview with Angus and Brian about the Donnington festival and a rivalry with Van Halen. "They're more of a pop band, I suppose, than we are." There's some goofing around in the studio warming up record "Gone Shooting" for VH1 as mics and cameras get fixed. The sound moves around and around, earphone to earphone, and Brian Johnson's mic doesn't pick up, but it's all good. Oh, but then it does. Phil Rudd's beat is unbreakable - it continues metronome-like throughout, totally workmanlike. A cool glimpse into a band warming up as the studio comes alive and gets hooked up around them. The final six-minute clip is of Angus and Malcolm playing in Leipzig in Germany with the Rolling Stones on June 20th 2003 as part of the Rolling Stones' Licks Tour, singing "Rock Me Baby". It's cool to see Mick and Angus onstage together, as Angus is sort of like a mini version of Mick Jagger anyway (doesn't anyone else think that they look alike? Of course, Mick is at least a head taller than Angus, but still...). There's a nice guitar pit shot, with Angus, Malcolm, Keith and Ron hanging out, but then Angus comes out and does a cool little solo, playing a red Gibson Casino with a Bigsby vibrato. Mick stands aside and wails a bit, but he doesn't really have much to do. Keith comes out for his own solo, also on a Gibson Casino with a Bigsby vibrato (but his is black), and it goes back into some singing, with plenty of honky tonk piano and some horns.

The DVD has a few cool extras, like a seven-minute "Scrapbook" video clip of various articles about the band drifting towards the camera one after another, most of them with cool titles like "AC/DC: Sex and energy combined", "AC/DC - Australia has punk Rock bands too, y'know", "A giant dose indeed", "The fastest knees in the west", "AC-DC punk rock invaders", "The lusts of AC/DC", "AC'DC boast of sex orgies", "Sex, snot, sweat and school kids (Or, AC/DC are back in town)", "Going deaf but loving every minute of it", "AC/DC's life on the road: no home, no rest and no pants", "AC/DC plugs into primitivism", "Dirty deeds delight US dodos", and "Destroy your brain with AC/DC". There's a great picture of Angus mooning the audience in one of the newspaper clippings, you can quite clearly see his nuts there. The article talks about The Damned hanging out backstage with the band after their gig at the Hammersmith Odeon. The scrapbook also has plenty of album ads, ticket stubs, magazine covers and concert bills One shows a line-up of Aerosmith, Foreigner, Pat Tavers, Van Halen and AC/DC! A Monsters of Rock bill describes Aerosmith, Ted Nugent, AC/DC and Mahogany Rush at Oakland on July 21st, 1979!! Then there's The Who, AC/DC, Nils Lofgren and the Stranglers at Wembley on August 18th 1979!!! AC/DC play with Judas Priest December 7th 1979 in Reims in France!!!! Then the ugly articles come - Bon Scott found dead on February 20th, 1980. Oh man... The "Scrapbook" on the second disc is less interesting, with articles declaring the search for a replacement for Bon Scott was over, and then backstage passes, flyers for shows, ticket stubs, and other memorabilia. As the years go by, articles come with lame titles like "AC/DC - they just can't stop touring", "No power shortage", "Highway to heaven", "Giving the fans what they expect: rowdiness" and "AC/DC - the last rock `n' roll heroes".

Disc 1 shows performances by early AC/DC (Bon Scott) and is classic hard rock. The live version of "Baby Please Don't Go" is stunning. For hard rock fans only.

AC-CD LIVE SHOWS ARE SURELY ADRENALINE PACKED!!! YOU'LL NEVER GET BORED & SLEEPY SEEING & HEARING BON, ANGUS & BRIAN DOING THIER HARD ROCK N ROLL LIVE KICKS!!!

I gave this 5 stars because these CDs show that Brian Johnson couldn't hold up Bon Scott's jock strap. At least when Bon sang, you could understand the lyrics unlike the screeching cat sound out of Brian. May Bon rest in peace.

I'll keep this short. If you dig Family Jewels, you'll love this as a live addendum. If you don't get that last sentence, avoid this DVD set and go for AC/DC "No Bull" live, which is definitely the best w/ Brian show ever recorded and released. Gotta go, my Kilkenny is getting warm.