For several years, countless live video and DVDs, abysmal and passable bootlegs and two attended concerts (incl. Shaking hands with Brian Johnson) later, I can "Ball Breaker" now fit into the overall context in which I can not help but the work still to look with slightly transfigured view. And so I will not say it's the best album of Australians, but it's definitely that what I like most here today. Wanting to accuse AC / DC originality bordering a knavery, but in this case, I get this predicate. And even though I try to be objective, I have to say that hardly songwriting of Angus & Malcolm ever so sophisticated, so dramatically staged, was as versatile as here - at least in the Brian Johnson era.
For the band, it was after the sensational success with the smoothed "The Razor's Edge" five years earlier and extensive world tour, a step back to one's roots - especially Phil Rudd, drummer of the original lineup, after more than ten years of abstinence with its tilting and his furrowed Skull grin returned again on the stool behind the bass drum and the two rack toms. Rick Rubin as producer did the rest of the band to miss a rougher, earthier sound - the times of Kommerzanbiederung à la "Money Talks" were over, here bone dry Blue Rock was operated on its own, without Sperenzien. But with a twist which has its own character, its own personality gives every song - and that's with AC / DC - for all their love - saying something. Especially when compared with the oversized stretch very unimaginative successors "Stiff Upper Lip" and particularly "Black Ice", then it is clear that creative force anno 1995 was at work here.
Then as now, captivates every song its own individual charm. There's the gloomy-driving "The Fury", the dry Blues on the "Boogie Man", the hymn-like "Hail Caesar", the sweaty title track, demonstrating impressive what you can do with a Zweiakkordriff. This can then only AC / DC, which is the supreme art of Simplizismus. Best I still like the song I like best from all over the band's history: "Burning Alive", with its dramatic structure and the grandiose chorus. The is the same principle as so often only two words, namely "Burning" and "Alive", but somehow liable to him something other than majestic, sublime and uplifting. As such, the ingredients are thus the same as always with AC / DC, the song relevant and never überkandidelten drumming Phil Rudd, about Brian Johnson coughing voice and Angus Young's solo escapades based on Malcolm's - this time dust-dry - rhythm track, but I hear more: A Fire , a passion, and provide a wealth of ideas that make more than the sum of its ingredients from the individual components.
It shows to what AC / DC songs are capable of when they are given room to unfold, here different moods are tried, the musical ingredients develop an unsuspected effectiveness, only the guitar figure in the chorus of "whiskey on the rocks "- Small cause, big effect. Actually, a matter of course, one would think - but if you "Black Ice" is listening, where every good idea from stubborn 4/4-stroke, three chords and a 3 to 4-minute corset is suppressed and the boring monotony sinks, then you have I see well that "Ball Breaker" was the last feat of AC / DC. In any case, a thoroughly enjoyable, coherent body album with "Hard As A Rock" a great classic (the last?) Has spawned the band's history. There is no real low point on "Ball Breaker", no slip-ups, but a lot of enthusiasm, dynamism, and, yes, seen in the context I have to say: originality, so that it is now but has to figure out: Yes, "Ball Breaker" is the best album with Brian Johnson.
At least for me.
