RSSBlack Ice Derails Off of the Rock N’ Roll Train
Oct 20
Music AC/DC, Album, cd, Music, Review, wal-mart Comments Off
Anthems may be their gift (or strategy) but AC/DC’s first studio album in 8 years leads off with the rather lackluster track Rock N’ Roll Train. A sign of the times or just poor sequencing?
Turns out it doesn’t matter. Black Ice is uninspired AC/DC rock. From vocals to riffs, their signature sound permeates every song and that seems like it should be a good thing. The problem is that song after song seem kind of muted, from the “Hey Hey Heys” of Skies on Fire to strange pronunciation of Decibel (pronounced “deci-bell” which would be distracting if the track was even remotely listenable.) More to the point, anthems usually inspire sing-a-long kind of choruses, which are virtually missing here. Can you just see a crowd shouting “Big Jack, Big Jack, He said that he’s the only one who got a full sack”? If you can, you’re a better man than I.
Towards the end, it starts to feel like one is listening to the same song on repeat over and over again. Spoilin’ for a Fight sounds a lot like the title track. Not a solitary track stands out over another, and since AC/DC is eschewing typical promotional channels like digital singles, it’s hard to even know which song they want us to listen to. And the ballads are just turds.
Black Ice is only on sale at Wal-Mart, and the company has promised to create a mini-store concept to promote the album, complete with the band’s past catalog, t-shirts and other AC/DC-branded stuff. It will be a mild footnote if the band can rest on its reputation to sell Black Ice only at Wal-Mart, without any digital presence to speak of, as Garth Brooks did successfully. In this day and age, it’s one thing to eschew the Best Buys and Targets of the world, but it’s foolhardy to cut out amazon.com and iTunes. Especially when your music just plain ole sucks.
