Was it ever any wonder what this week’s IOTW was going to be?

This week we will look at the latest album by AC/DC which we already discussed at a high level. Today we will look at the music itself and how the latest offering measures up against previous releases. I must admit, I am not a huge AC/DC fan, but I am a huge music fan so I think my critique will be pretty fair considering.

Tracks

‘Black Ice’ offers up 15 tracks, their longest album to-date:

1. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Train”
2. “Skies on Fire”
3. “Big Jack”
4. “Anything Goes”
5. “War Machine”
6. “Smash ‘n’ Grab”
7. “Spoilin’ for a Fight”
8. “Wheels”
9. “Decibel”
10. “Stormy May Day”
11. “She Likes Rock ‘n’ Roll”
12. “Money Made”
13. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Dream”
14. “Rocking All the Way”
15. “Black Ice”

Response

‘Black Ice’ isn’t the greatest album you’ll ever buy, nor will it be the most memorable. However, it does offer up tunes that more likely will stick with you. There are tracks on this album that they might be able to do without simply because they are either a little too overdone, or because they don’t strike me as very “AC/DC-esque”.

“Rock ‘n Roll Train” is the current single off this CD, but I think there are other easy contenders to such a spot. “Rock ‘n Roll Dream”, “Black Ice”, and “War Machine” are all great songs that you might never expect if you just heard the current single. Truly, the single is not indicative of the quality of the rest of the album.

Strong solos by Angus Young and the same great vocals from Brian Johnson make this much the same music we have come to enjoy by the band. However, there seems to be more solos on this album than I have really heard them do before… take that as you will; for better or worse.

Missing something

I don’t know if maybe we were spoiled with ‘Back in Black’ but this album seems to be missing that essential something. I don’t know if maybe its a song on the quality of “Hell’s Bells” or that ‘Back in Black’ just had such a long string of great songs, including the song of the same title. Maybe its a mistake, but I tend to use ‘Back in Black’ as a measure of the quality of other AC/DC albums and ‘Black Ice’ seems to fall short of it.

There just aren’t as many catchy tunes that you find yourself coming back to as you can find on other AC/DC albums. Like I said, there are a few that I like to jump to, but for the most part there are many songs that I would skip by, including “Big Jack”, “She Likes Rock ‘n’ Roll”, and “Spoilin’ for a Fight”. Don’t get me wrong, these are great songs from a musicianship point of view, they just lack something in my opinion.

Go ahead and pick it up

Despite it’s pitfalls, this is a good album. I really think you should go ahead and pick it up if you have been teetering on the fence about it. It might not be the best album they have ever released, but it will find a decent home in your collection.

Perhaps for those drunken nights when you just want a crazy rock album to jam to…