My part in AC/DC is just adding the color on top. Mal's the band's foundation. | | | | Malcolm Young rocking a high voltage open E chord, circa 1980.
(Larry Hulst/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) | | | | | | “My part in AC/DC is just adding the color on top. Mal's the band's foundation.”
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| | rantnrave:// Malcolm Young was a strange, singular figure in rock and roll: a (possibly *the*) chief creative force in one of the world's biggest bands who spent most of his life avoiding the part of the stage closest to the audience, who shunned the spotlight everywhere else, and who was maybe the fourth-best-known-member of said band. Who else can claim that? Top of my head, the person who comes closest is DR. DRE, though he eventually decided that standing in front could be fun sometimes. Malcolm Young hung back next to his MARSHALL stacks for the better part of four decades, engineering one of the most distinctive, and consistent, sounds in the rock and roll canon with his virtuoso rhythm guitar playing. "WHOLE LOTTA ROSIE." "WHAT'S NEXT TO THE MOON." "BACK IN BLACK." "WHO MADE WHO." His younger brother ANGUS and singers BON SCOTT and BRIAN JOHNSON drove their squealing and squelching hot rods over bridges that Malcolm built and re-built time and time again. Malcolm created space for them. Literally. The secret to his greatness, besides his unique ability to swing while sounding like a metronome, was his instinct for when and what not to play. So many of AC/DC's greatest moments are testaments to blank space. Big spaces. Little spaces. They may have been one of the loudest bands ever to stand on an arena stage, but they never overplayed. The Young brothers wrote all the music together and while it's never been clear who did what exactly, here's Angus doing some AC/DCsplaining: "Mal's always been one to come up with melody ideas... Malcolm will dial in a melody, and likes to get it so it's all hooking together and feels right." Malcolm also tended to dial in Angus' guitar tone for him. He wasn't at the mic screaming and he wasn't wearing a schoolboy uniform. He was in the back with his 1963 GRETSCH JET FIREBIRD, detonating the rock and roll TNT like a veteran demolition expert. To those who have rocked for the last time, we salute you... The complicated and disturbing story behind MEEK MILL's imprisonment. And a plea to #FreeMeek from JAY-Z, writing on the NEW YORK TIMES op-ed page... The keywords "popular," "American" and "band" are all loaded in one way or another, but here's the statistical argument for why MAROON 5 are the 21st century kings of that... CMT is saying goodbye to NASHVILLE, the show not the city, which I stopped watching when I realized none of the show's mix-and-match couples was ever going to last more than three episodes, but damn a lot of good songs have passed through those scripts... NASHVILLE, the city not the show, continues to leaves its doors open to TAYLOR SWIFT... Commercial music supervisor BUZZY COHEN wins the JEOPARDY Tournament of Champions, with a little help from an '80s love songs category. Buzzy can thank LIONEL RICHIE and RICK ASTLEY for a portion of his $250,000 winnings... RIP also: MEL TILLIS, a hall of fame songwriter and performer, and BAMBINO GOLD... And thoughts, prayers and hugs to DAVID CASSIDY, PAM THE FUNKSTRESS and SCOTT MCCAUGHEY. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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| | | ruby, don't take your love to town |
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| The guitarist, who died yesterday at the age of sixty-four, was the soul of the seminal rock band, its leader on and off the stage. | | |
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| Let the disturbing allegations against Brand New’s Jesse Lacey be the start of an overdue conversation, in which emo’s third wave acknowledges that it was unfair to female fans. | | |
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| Last week, Brian Diaz, a former guitar tech for Long Island emo legends Brand New, sparked a conversation on Facebook. In a since-deleted public thread, he asked, "So while we are on the topic of outing famous and semi-famous creeps, anyone want to speak up about Jesse Lacey from Brand New?" | | |
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| At home with the chart-topping rapper as he sounds off on race, guns, his buddy Justin Bieber, and the pleasures of Olive Garden. | | |
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| For almost 40 years, Philip Norman has wrestled with icons, egos and artists (not to mention their widows) to reveal the untold tales of Britain's musical takeover. | | |
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| With a fair wind, Spotify’s long-anticipated public offering should happen before the end of Q2 2018 (and yes, probably a direct listing rather than an IPO but ‘IPO’ worked better in the title!) . The music industry will be watching with keen interest as it is going to be the bellwether for the streaming music sector. | | |
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| Listen to these with a candle burning and you’ll see your favorite films. | | |
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| Small clubs hope that a new City Hall office will make it easier to navigate New York City’s licensing bureaucracy. | | |
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| Ten years, five probation violations, and one harsh sentence later, Meek Mill’s case is a complicated example of a bigger criminal-justice problem. | | |
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| Mel Tillis was known for many accomplishments in music, but he's also known to a generation as being one of the most famous people with the speech impediment known as stuttering. In the 80's, Whataburger decided to take the initiative with their famous stammering spokesperson to make a point and inspire people. | | |
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| AC/DC singer Brian Johnson perches on the edge of a sofa in a New York hotel room with a blank look on his face, mumbling to himself in a grainy whisper, his head and shoulders drooping with exhaustion. There is nothing wrong with him. Johnson, who is built like a bear and who talks in a booming growl, is doing his imitation of guitarist Angus Young on tour, backstage just before showtime. | | |
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| The country has become a tourism mecca when travel restrictions were eased--and now the electronic group is trying to bring modern music to its youth. | | |
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| Tickets Cloud founder Katerina Kirillova highlights some of the companies hoping to revolutionise the music business using blockchain technology. | | |
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| In a new book, the former Kiss front man is actually telling people how to live, and, chillingly, others seem to be listening. | | |
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| The acclaimed rapper argues that the music he makes could fit into hip-hop, electronic or alternative categories at the annual awards, if only the Academy could see past its biases. | | |
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| How cheap compilation CDs helped revive a genre. | | |
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| Can there be more than one Chance the Rapper? | | |
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| A year into the return of winter in America, the words of Scott-Heron have proven to be hauntingly relevant. | | |
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| Elvis has his share of impersonators. Obscure 60s garage rockers and neo-Nazi punks, less so. We meet the weirdest tribute acts on the circuit -- from an all-women Fall to a heavy metal Bee Gees. | | |
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| She has always been several steps ahead of her time, which is something I learned before, during and after a chat we had over several months. | | |
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