Powerage (1978)
1. Rock 'n' Roll Damnation
2. Down Payment Blues
3. Gimme a Bullet
4. Riff Raff
5. Sin City
6. What's Next to the Moon
7. Gone Shootin'
8. Up to My Neck in You
9. Kicked in the Teeth
This album stands at a crucial crossroads in the AC/DC saga—a moment just before fame knocked the doors off their hinges, and when the grit under their fingernails still shaped every note they played. Keith Richards, never one for frivolous praise, once declared it his favorite of the group. And rightly so. It’s the unsung masterpiece of the Bon Scott era: less about the big hits, more about the blood and brawn behind the amplifier.
Unlike the more familiar titles from earlier records—High Voltage, Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, Let There Be Rock— Powerage doesn’t flash its credentials. The tracklist won’t leap from the page like a Greatest Hits montage. But therein lies its power: this is AC/DC stripped of gloss and studio polish, digging into their own mythos with unfaltering swagger. There are no weak links. None. Each of the nine tracks pulls its weight, either kicking down the door or dragging you through the dirt by your collar.
Production-wise, Powerage marks the end of an era: Harry Vanda and George Young (himself kin to Malcolm and Angus) oversaw this last effort before yielding to Mutt Lange’s arena-sized polish. While Lange brought precision and mass appeal, the Vanda/Young period—especially here—felt like being locked in a barroom brawl with a Marshall stack. It was primal, lived-in, feral.
The band itself was evolving too. Bassist Mark Evans was swapped for Cliff Williams, who, if lore is to be believed, could sing backing vocals (unlike his predecessor). Could most fans tell the difference? Unlikely. This is AC/DC, after all—where the rhythm section roars like a locomotive, not a string quartet. Still, Cliff would go on to become a fixture, a reliable engine room presence whose longevity speaks volumes.
Musically, Powerage does what every AC/DC album aims to do—namely, blast your face off—but here it’s tighter, meaner, and more cohesive than ever before. It’s often said that AC/DC songs are interchangeable; that their signature sound is more formula than evolution. Perhaps. But that’s like accusing the Ramones of writing the same song a hundred times. When it works, it works. And Powerage works—start to finish.
There are highlights, of course. Riff Raff is the undisputed crown jewel, a whiplash-inducing blend of manic fretwork and Scott’s sneering vocal drawl. Kicked in the Teeth closes the album with a thundering nod to Zeppelin—much as Let There Be Rock had done the year before. And in Down Payment Blues, Bon delivers his finest lyrical irony: a broke rockstar dreaming of a Cadillac. It’s tongue-in-cheek poverty set to thunderclaps.
What separates Powerage from its siblings, even from the titans like Highway to Hell or Back in Black, is hunger. This is the last studio album they recorded before the floodgates of fame swung open. It carries the punch of a band still scrapping for its place in the pantheon. There’s gravel in the voice, grease on the fretboard, and fire in every riff.
They’d go on to bigger things. But rarely better.
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