The Dirty Dozen
Guitar World's Guide to the 12 Greatest Guitar Sounds of ALL Time.
By Alan Di Perna, Chris Gill, Jeff Gilbert, & Nick Bowcott
I've only included the AC/DC artical
Angus & Malcolm Young
ALBUM: BallBreaker
STUDIO: Ocean Way, Los Angles
PRODUCERS: Rick Rubin & AC/DC
The classic AC/DC crunch has thrived thoughout the years with little variation and absolutly no dillution of its 100 proof kick. Why tamper with perfection? Sometime during their teen years in Australia Angus and Malcolm Young concocted the right formula. Malcolm holds down rhythm on his customized '63 Gretsch Jet Fire Bird while Angus cuts loose on a Gibson SG. For AC/DC's latest album, BallBreaker, the brothers Young honed their timeless guitar formula to a razor sharp edge.
"We went through all the old Marshall's in our wearhouses in London and took our time picking out the best ones," says Angus.
Long time AC/DC guitar technician Alan Rogan elaborates: "We had a pile of Marshall amps, but for Malcolm, it boiled down to a 100 watt plexi '66. In fact it may have even been a '65- it has a hand bent alluminum chassis. He used this with a Marshall cab loaded with 25 watt Greenbacks. Besides his guitar, that was it-no effects. For Angus we narrowed it down to three JTM 45 plexi heads: one for the track, one for power chords and one for solos. And there weren't many power chord tracks. For the rhythm tracks, the head went through a Marshall cabinet with Vintage 30 Celestions. But for solos, we bought an old Marshal basket weave cabinet and put new Greenbacks in-same as Malcolm."
Guitarwise, angus mainly played a '64 Gibson SG, although he occasionally used two '68 SG's. Both brothers use Fender Extra picks. And for Ballbreaker, Rogan even tracked down some old sets of heavy Gibson Sonomatic strings(.012-.056)that Malcolm swore by in the early days. The rest was sheer testosterone.
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