I’m reading Joe Bonomo’s book AC/DC’s Highway To Hell, part of the diverting 33 1/3 series by Continuum. The series matches a famous (or infamous) album with a music critic who analyzes the album, the music industry of the era, the tribulations of the band and producers, and the critical and popular response. Others in the series I’ve particularly enjoyed are The Beatles’ Let It Be by Steve Matteo, Neil Young’s Harvest by Sam Inglis, and the superb David Bowie’s Low by Hugo Wilcken. I encountered the series by chance. I found myself in Austin for South by Southwest Film Festival and a wedding and stopped by Waterloo Records. Even then (this is perhaps four years back) I no longer purchased CDs and was in the process of dumping the ones I already had onto iTunes. I saw the 33 1/3 book about Guns ‘n Roses Use Your Illusion I and II by Eric Weisbard. I opened it at a random page and began to read. I really wanted to keep reading (this is my litmus test for books; if I can open to a random page and enjoy the prose and content, I buy the book). Love ’em or hate ’em, Gunners made for good rock ‘n roll stories. I stayed up the whole night reading it. I was immediately hooked on the series.

For a list of the complete series to date, click here. In honor of the Bonomo book, which I’ve just finished (train read), I thought we’d take a look back at the legendary video for the legendary title track of that album, the last the charismatic Bon Scott would record before his “death by misadventure,” which we call “alcohol poisoning” in the US. The band conveys fantastic, boyish energy in this promo video. Mutt Lange’s excellent production (he convinced the band to tune the guitars, for starters) brings the band’s feral energy into focus. And there’s Bon, probably drunk, grinning in his luciferian way, already an old codger at age 33. Enjoy! And pick up some of the books from the 33 1/3 series.