AC/DC Was Almost Dropped By Record Company In 1977
March 28, 2012According to The Pulse Of Radio, AC/DC was in danger of being dropped from their label, Atlantic Records, just prior to the release of the band's 1977 album "Let There Be Rock". Phil Carson, the exec who got AC/DC signed to the label, revealed to Classic Rock magazine, "They'd delivered [1976's] 'Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap', which I thought was pretty good. But the Atlantic A&R department [in the U.S.] said, 'We're sorry, but this album doesn't make it. We're not gonna put it out and we're dropping the band.' And everybody was unanimous in this, by the way — everybody."
Carson continued, "I said: 'I think you're making a very big mistake.' . . . So I went to Neshui [Ertegun, co-owner of Atlantic] and showed him the sales figures that we'd got for [1976's] 'High Voltage'. They were not awe-inspiring but considering we'd only paid $25,000 for the album, this was not so bad."
Ertegun agreed with Carson and allowed him to re-sign the band. Three years later, they became one of the biggest bands in the world with the release of 1980's "Back In Black", which has sold 49 million copies worldwide.
Singer Brian Johnson revealed last month that unspecified health issues for a different, unidentified member of AC/DC were delaying the start of work on the band's next album, although he added that a "full recovery" was expected.
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