OK, here we go. Flew into NY and headed for the hotel, when we get there, the Roseland is about 20 feet away,YES! Get up early to go and meet the person who's selling me the vouchers, to get the tickets(Hi Karen, I love you!). Get the vouchers and get in line. Have a chat with some guys and girls( From Arizona, Florida and NJ) in the Q spread the word on the Bon Scott group). Get The Tickets tell some guy from Epic to get the guys to do more of these shows a damn sight closer to where I live in future. Go to bed for a lie down!

Alarm goes at 6pm go down to the line outside the Ballroom, get some video footage of the mangy crowd outside bump into Buttonman (see pics to follow) and then Ciaran (How are you?) who proceeds to tell me all about meeting Mal earlier in the day (Bastard!) and shows me the photo to prove it (Double Bastard!!). Go get me wifey and get inside. The Ballroom is about the same size as the Cambridge Corn Exchange (I realise that means nothing to anyone outside England and probably Cambridge but there you go), its seen better days and looks a bit shabby (a bit like most of us I guess).

A support band come on about 8pm and get short shrift from the crowd, brave boys to take the challenge but they were always going to lose. They bugger off and volume increases. Just befor 9pm the lights go down the volume goes through the F**king roof Beano appears stage left and eggs on the crowd and minute later the rest of the gang turn up, Phil hits the hi-hat for a count of four and Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be hits us right between the eyes. A surprise to start to the show with, its exactly what I've travelled six thousand miles for, COME ON!! Beano thanks us all for turning up at the end of the song and introduces BIB, during this a couple girls right down the front hold a massive piece of cardboard requesting to duet with Beano, at the end of the song Beano says he'll think about what song they could do. SUL follows, the sound is absolutely fantastic, crystal clear and as loud as you'd expect. I forgot to mention the 'interesting' psychedelic shirt Beano's wearing, there must be a photo somewhere. SUL ends and B tells the crowd that the boys are going to dust off some old stuff tonight. Mal hits the chord I've wanted to hear for twenty years.....Its 'Gone Fucking Shootin'!!!!!! ( I'd like to take this opportunity to apologise to guy in front of me who I accidently headbutted at the beginning of this song, I just couldn't help it) my favourite song including an extended length coda. My trip had already been worth it!

Around this time there was a great little moment when Ang noticed that someone had chucked a bra onto the stage and him and Mal and Beano had a chuckle about it, and this is where this show was so different to the normal show, you could really see the guys reallyhaving a laugh and communicating with each other, a couple of times they seemed to have a chat about what they were going to do next.

Anyway Thunderstruck followed, I didn't feel that this tune worked as well in this club as it does in a massive arena, I missed the huge roar as it kicks in, that said it still rocked. But not as much as what was about to happen. No intro just Mal hitting the chord ....Its Rock 'N' Roll Damnation, 25 years since this has been played, opening track on their greatest album, never heard it live....I screamed like a schoolgirl! Now I'm in danger of losing control totally, Damnation ends and Beano tells me they're going to play Whats Next To the Moon, what are they trying to do kill me? It is incredibly even better than you can imagine, seriously it is fucking unbelievable, they could have walked off stage at the end and I could have flown home without a Jumbo. It doesn't matter what they do now I've got what I wanted from this gig and we're only 7 songs in.

Beano walks across the stage to say he's heard there are some guys (and Girls) from England in the crowd, we scream but he can't hear us, so he tells the crowd that New Yorkers aren't too bad(or something like that)

Hard As A Rock next, always forget just how massive this riff is, Love It! On comes The Jack, its a different version to the one we normally get, shorter, more to the point, Ang does his strip shows us his AC/DC shorts AND THEN BARES HIS SCRAWNY ARSE at us, comes back to the song with some lovely new bluesy work before unleashing his best solo of the night I'm not making this up it was like white lightning coming out the end of his guitar. Beano comes back from his his break after a costume change, the old black shirt's back on. And the bastards do it again....no intro from Beano, Mal just starts up again, Side Two, Track Three, HTH, its 'If You Want Blood'. Fuckers!! Everybody around me goes totally apeshit and its fantastic (Have I used that word before?) Crunching riff and majestic crowd vocals. Nuff Said?

From here on in its pretty much greatest hits stuff, Hells Bells, DDDDC but there was a couple more special moments, before the next song Beano comes to the front of the stage and tells the crowd that two of Bons nephews are in the Ballroom with us, theres a spontaneous round of applause and Beano says " Hes still here, still with us", Ang starts up Rock And Roll Ain't Noise Pollution and "It'll always be with us, never gonna die" has never been more strongly felt. Shoot To Thrill is as always five minutes of quality riffage. T.N.T. follows and Brian tells the girl who wanted to sing with him to get onstage now, she makes it just in time for the third chorus, I don't know who enjoyed it more her or Beano (You'll see what I mean when the pictures are up). The guys launched into HTH and Rosie to close the show. They filed back on five minutes later fags in mouths and gave us YSMANL before disappearing for good.

So that was it! Was it worth the stress? the journey? the money? What do you think.

by Supanet

The Roseland is only about the size of a high school gym. So when the played TNT and everyone went "OI" you could hear the echo. Then Brian brought a girl from the audience to sing along. Every time she jumped up and down, Brian would point at her chest as if to say "Look at em Bounce"

Brian also said some of Bon Scott's relative were there, then they went into Rock and Roll Aint Noise Pollution.

With what happened to Great White I wasn't surprised they didn't play For Those About To Rock. But I was surprised they didnt play Let There Be Rock.

My ears are still ringing, I was about ten rows from the stage. This will be a concert I will never forget. {ACFLUCKINDC}

Angus' cap stayed on him longer than usual due to his new short-cropped hairdo and the fact that he doesn't move like he used to. That's not to say he didn't rock hard, but that his spasmodic episodes were more spread out.

One could hardly tell the difference, anyway, as he and the band hammered out a fantastic nearly 2 hour set.

What made this concert special was their splash through the fringes of their catalog. Three fantastic songs from the feverishly melodic Powerage album and If You Want Blood from Highway To Hell. The crowd went nuts when they played Gone Shootin' (the first of the three from Powerage), but the look of awe and wonderment really struck when they played What's Next To The Moon. It was something truly special indeed. Both songs fit Brian Johnson's voice quite well and they added a freshness to the show.

Initially, If You Want Blood's tempo seemed a little slower than the manic stomp of the studio version, but suddenly as they rushed into the final chorus, Phil pounded his drums a little harder and a little faster to give the ending a frothing climax like nothing I have seen before.

In fact Phil's playing was the underlying engine of the night. I have seen the two tours since Phil's return and I can tell you that his drumming has just gotten better and better. Malcolm and Cliff hung in tight to Phil's thunderous drums creating the wall of sound for Angus and Brian screech and wail over.

Gone were the extended solos, lengthy striptease and overblown stadium props (save for the tasteful toll of the Bell - which hung directly over my head). Instead Acca Dacca focused on the songs proving themselves to be more than just bombast, but bombast with a feeling. Something you can bang your head and hum along to. And, worry not, young readers, we still got to see Angus' ass.

Brian came on stage in a wild tye-died Hawaiian shirt, much different than his usual black t-shirt. He looked like that lascivious uncle that inappropriately stares at the young cousins at family outings. His voice was in great shape though without the wear and tear of months on the road. He looked extremely pleased when one female fan got herself on stage to sing the last chorus of TNT. Angus and Malcolm gave each other a little knowing smile as Brian and his new gal pal shared the mic.

The crowd was totally into it. The kind of crowd that spends hours on the phone trying to get through to radio stations to win the precious rare ticket or the fan willing to drive 200 miles or more down to NY City and spend hundreds of dollars just to see his favorite band wail away in 2003. Rosie, Highway and Dirty Deeds always leave the fans salivating violently and it was no different this time round.\par \par Rosie ended the show without it's typical Let There Be Rock follow up. Just as well as I'm getting old and my neck and back were starting to hurt from all the thrashing about.

Sadly, the boys only came out for one encore. You Shook Me All Night Long replaced For Those About To Rock as the night's closer. This may have been due to the size of the venue or to a decision to cut back on the props. Maybe the cannons couldn't get a Visa in time? Either way, it was not missed as everyone was happy to hear the more rare songs instead.\par \par My friend and I chatted on the way out about how awesome it would have been to do one more encore of It's A Long Way To The Top, sort of encapsulating their career from the Outback to the Hall of Fame. But how can I nit-pick? They played What's Next To The Moon for god's sake!

I just want to thank AC/DC for rocking my ass since I was reborn in 1980 at the tender age of 13!

Rock!!!!

Review by Stephen Donlan

NEW YORK - It was a rare opportunity to stand in the face of giants.

On Tuesday night, fresh from their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, AC/DC crammed their stadium-rattling sound into the relatively cozy confines of Roseland Ballroom. The Australian force has been playing arenas and theaters for the better part of the last 30 years, but that evening the band went slumming (comparatively speaking), performing for a crowd of roughly 3,000 contest winners and music industry insiders.

While the locale was smaller, the band still served up the trademark larger-than -life thunder that has made AC/DC synonymous with driving stadium rock. The free show was billed as the group's only U.S. show this year, and the brothers Young and company seemed to cram a full tour's worth of energy into their hour-and-a-half-long set.

Along with super-sized sound and energy, the band also brought its familiar stage roles from the stadium to the club. Guitarist Angus Young, sporting his requisite schoolboy outfit, duck-walked and lurched across the stage while contorting his face with each lick. Frontman Brian Johnson — tucked, as always, under a black cap — stalked the stage and worked the crowd like a chatty pub owner.

"You know the words to these ones, do you?" Johnson joked after cranking out "Back in Black," the title track from the sixth biggest-selling album of all time.

The group even trotted out a few familiar set pieces usually reserved for larger venues. A giant bell descended from the ceiling at the beginning of "Hell's Bells" and Angus pranced through his usual striptease during the breakdown of "The Jack." However, the bulk of the night's oomph was provided solely by the music.

Backed by a simple drum riser and a wall of amps, AC/DC delivered a set thick with hits, yet peppered with surprises. As always, favorites like "Back in Black," "Highway to Hell," and "You Shook Me All Night Long" were powerfully rendered, but from the unconventional opener "Hell Ain't a Bad Place to Be," it was clear that the band had at least a few curveballs in its arsenal. Chances are even the most die-hard AC/DC fan didn't expect to hear three cuts off of 1978's overlooked Powerage, but those tracks were woven seamlessly together with well-worn stadium anthems ("Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap," "T.N.T.," "Highway to Hell") and more recent material ("Stiff Upper Lip"). Thanks to steadfast dedication to a fistful of power chords throughout their career, one anthem flowed smoothly to the next as if they were all cooked up during the same insanely productive recording session in 1976.

That direct, simple, no -nonsense approach has helped the band to sell more than 140 million records worldwide over the last three decades. As the night indicated, the band isn't content to sit back and cash royalty checks. Much of the group's classic work has recently been remastered, repackaged and re-released, and the band plans to soon begin work on a new studio album.

That album could reach plenty of fresh ears, based on the crowd gathered at Roseland. While the audience was heavy on fans who likely saw AC/DC at least once before original vocalist Bon Scott passed in 1980 (many of them sporting AC/DC shirts older than most of the acts on this week's top 10), there was plenty of "fresh blood" on the floor of Roseland. The band's bluesy, ballsy rock hit young and old alike. There was the lanky teen boy clad in an oversized dress shirt, tie, and shorts (an homage to Angus' schoolboy get-up) pumping his fist and singing along. There was the teenage girl, sporting a tank top and a cap suspiciously like the one worn by Johnson, throwing her metal horns in the air and banging her head. There was the pocket of 30-something men, built like NFL linemen and decked out in Harley Davidson gear from head to toe, suddenly boogying like limber children. Hugs, hi-fives, and hearty slaps on the back replaced moshing as the standard form of expression, a sign of the outright glee that the band inspires.

Perhaps the following is as much a testament to the band's sound as it is to how they've used it. Unlike other rock journeymen, AC/DC have never reduced their songs to jingles, never collaborated with the flavor of the week and never plopped out a power ballad. They've simply served up 30 years of blues-rooted, fist-pumping rock, and in the process, they've made a strong case for claiming the title of the greatest rock band around.

AC/DC's set from March 11 at New York's Roseland Ballroom:
• "Hell Ain't a Bad Place to Be" (from 1977's Let There Be Rock)
• "Back in Black" (from 1980's Back In Black)
• "Still Upper Lip" (from 2000's Stiff Upper Lip)
• "Gone Shootin' " (from 1978's Powerage)
• "Thunderstruck" (from 1990's The Razor's Edge)
• "Rock & Roll Damnation" (from 1978's Powerage)
• "What's Next to the Moon" (from 1978's Powerage)
• "Hard As a Rock" (from 1995's Ballbreaker)
• "The Jack" (from 1976's High Voltage)
• "If You Want Blood" (from 1979's Highway To Hell)
• "Hell's Bells" (from 1980's Back In Black)
• "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" (from Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap)
• "Rock & Roll Ain't Noise Pollution" (from 1980's Back in Black)
• "Shoot to Thrill" (from 1980's Back In Black)
• "T.N.T." (from 1976's High Voltage)
• "Highway to Hell" (from 1979's Highway To Hell)
• "Whole Lotta Rosie" (from 1977's Let There Be Rock)
• "You Shook Me All Night Long" (from 1980's Back In Black