If you ever had any doubts about AC/DC, leave them at the door. You're not welcome here in the city hall of rock. Because after over 40 years of hard rock and hard rolling, there's one thing you can count on AC/DC to do: rock. The song "Realize" opens this beast of an album, and it is aptly titled: you definitely realize you're about to get your butt kicked. Despite the looming destruction and political turmoil of 2020, AC/DC's
Power Up came at us like Ken Bone or the Christmas Truce in WW1 - forget about your troubles, have a beer, AC/DC is here, the beasts of rock.
Brian sounds like Elmo's cousin who lives in a trash can in hell, a complete beast. His lyrics evoke images of Hooters, Chili's, TGI Friday's even - the grit and grime beneath the serenity, a juxtaposition utilized by David Lynch in
Blue Velvet. Cliff and Phil provide a rhythm section so tight you'd think they were virgins. Lucky for your ears and mine, they've aged like fine cheese, and they smell like it, too - take a listen to "Shot in the Dark" and tell me you can't smell that groove like sharp cheddar being farted right in your face. "Kick You When You're Down" might as well have been written by black women in the 1960's, such soul it emits, a super soaker filled with soul. And if you made it this far, you're pure enough to know we lost the great Malcolm Young in 2017, a harbinger of the turning of the tides in rock. But if there's anything this band represents, it's standing in the face of adversity and telling it to suck your butthole. Stevie Young saves the day like when someone scores a last minute point in a game of sports - the world was the opposing team, and it thought it had beaten AC/DC, but the super bowl of rock never ends for the Aussie beasts.
You might think it's strange that I haven't mention the 5'2'' beast known as Angus Young, the wild boar who spins riffs and weaves solos crunchy like peanut butter, and not the creamy kind. Some would say he's the Frank Zappa of Australian hard rock, such is his attention to detail and perfectionism. He has fine tuned this well-oiled machine like an insane vibrator of beastly rock.
If you like sharp melodies, crunchy riffs, energetic solos, passionate vocals, and grooves,
Power Up is the wake-up fart to shatter the grey cloud of gloom that loomed over much of 2020 - the "morning thunder," if you will, to wake up everyone in this house of rock beasts. Leave elitism at the door. You're not 15 anymore. It's okay to admit to yourself that you love AC/DC. Say it with me now. I love AC/DC.
