Is Highway to Hell (Stylistically) the first "Hair" or Pop Metal album?

You are right, I got them reversed. Highway to Hell is the blueprint for Def Leppard's sound.

 

No

 

Mutt played a huge role with HTH...just go listen to the original/demo versions of Touch Too Much and Get It Hot on Bonfire, they both suck big time.

 

I'd say no, as hair/pop metal to me is all about flashy playing and over the top production. AC/DC is completely meat and potatoes. I don't mean that as a slur, but compare to say, Boston.

 

For me it's Pyromania. AC/DC never fit the hair metal genre, as their sound was already very well established. The Leps were at the tail end of the NWOBHM movement, where they never really fit, and Pyromania was a true stylistic break from that sound. Basically you can filter the next ten years of pop metal through "Foolin" and "Rock Of Ages" and " Too Late For Love" without changing much. The lead vocals, the harmonies, the layering of acoustic and electric guitars... Even the keyboards that acts like Bon Jovi and Whitesnake used to sweeten their sound first show on Pyromania.

A landmark album and arguably the first, and best, "hair metal" album. And no, I don't consider that a dirty term as much as a silly one that defines a large segment of rock in the 1982-92 era.

 

No, we can't agree.

 

No. I have no idea how anyone would ever consider such a statement.

 

No.

 

When it came out in 1979 and someone listened to it for the first time, did it sound like Def Leppard then?

 

I would. It makes sense to me.

The only reason I can think of why people disagree with the idea is because they like AC/DC, but don't like the "hair" metal bands of the 80s.

 

HELL NO. Just needed to be said again.

 

Members of this forum have very different ideas of what "pop metal" "glam metal" "heavy metal" are, and none of them need to be wrong or correct. This invites confusion over many terms, and so one will likely get lots of different perspectives to your question.

With that said, AC/DC looked like, sounded like, and was marketed as a hard rock/pop metal act, along with the likes of Ratt, Winger, Motley Crue, and all the rest by about 1982, if not earlier. They weren't glam, however. Looking back, Highway to Hell presented a winning formula that many pop (hair) metal bands later came to emulate.

 

No way, when they sung Highway to Hell they really meant it. Evidence is all over the place, including their lead singer corpse

 

First exposure I ever had to AC/DC was on that notorious Midnight Special broadcast in '78, when host Ted Nugent supposedly said he would only do the show if all the other acts were hard rock. At the time, I was really interested in the concept of "heavy metal" and I considered any group that played riffs and had vicious, distorted lead guitar was a "heavy metal" band. In that light, I thought that AC/DC easily fit into the "heavy metal" category. So did Ted, for that matter. So it seemed to me that "heavy metal" was a pretty broad tent in those days, and I never met anyone back then who argued with me about what's "heavy metal." If there was any discussion about it, it would be someone who liked "heavy metal" and someone who hated it and liked punk/new wave instead. Me and my friends who liked hard and heavy music were content to use "heavy metal" and "hard rock" interchangeably, and were OK with the idea that some bands like Aerosmith or even Queen might have a couple "heavy metal" tracks but were not necessarily a "heavy metal" band. In a sense things were quite gentrified - no one in my circle was much into the Police or the Cars - but in another sense, there wasn't this artificial wall between "heavy metal" and other closely related styles that no one could agree on.

AC/DC did "Sin City" on that program and it's still out there on YouTube, and it's just as awesome now as it was in '78. I thought Angus Young actually had a seizure at one point.

 

And the point you are trying to make is what?
Just because HTH was released before Def Leppard entered the scene, you are implying that HTH could not have traits of what was later defined as Pop Metal that was evident with bands like Def Leppard?
Music is usually made and released in a continuum and the sources of influence are evident later on.

 

You got it right.

 

I thought my point was very clear. Saying that Highway sounds like Def Leppard is backwards.

 

I agree with all of that about Pyromania, but you can hear on half of the Highway to Hell album, where Pyromania originated with the same producer.

 

But the big difference with AC/DC is he didn't get involved with the songwriting. HTH is all Young/Young/Scott, while Pyromania has Lange credited on every track.

The AC/DC albums he made sound like AC/DC with different production, but the Leppard albums after High n' Dry are almost like Mutt Lange productions featuring Def Leppard.

 

That's an important distinction - AC/DC were a veteran band and not one that was aiming to be "hitmakers", while Def Leppard were a lot younger and wanted Lange to help make them become a hit machine. So they ceded more control to Lange. AC/DC didn't work that way.

 

An earlier post mentioned Ted Templeman's production as having some influence and I concur. I think he started to create the foundation for pop metal with early Montrose and really went for it with the first Van Halen record in 1978.

 

I think others are helping to make my point. HTH certainly has elements of what Def Leppard later did with Pyromania, but AC/DC are their own beast. No pop metal singer EVER sounded like Bon Scott, for example, and none of the 80s metal bands incorporated blues into their solos like Angus.

Pyromania had many elements distinctive to hair metal that didn't really appear before that point, namely:
--walls of layered, highly produced background vocals (which is definitely Mutt)
--very "big," heavily processed drums
--keyboards, period. (Doesn't seem like a big deal, but there were no synths from AC/DC or Maiden or Priest, and VH only brought them in with Diver Down, released that same year.)

And of course, the visual elements... Namely, that the Leps were younger and far more attractive than most metal acts of the day.

Pyromania definitely borrowed elements from HTH, and Slade, and glam in general. (And maybe some KISS and VH too.) I just think the specific combination is the first true incarnation of hair metal, while HTH isn't.

 

Valid points about the songwriting credits. I see your point. Leppard's sound is more directly influenced by Lange because he co wrote the songs as well as produced them. Still, from what I read, he still had input on how the Scott/Young songs were re-arranged and finalized. He had a lot of influence on how they chose to craft those songs.

 

I think what you're getting at is there's little identifiable ML production tricks creeping in to the AC/DC sound, but the smart thing is he knew just how far to take it with AC/DC, as I doubt they were about to sacrifice the essence of their band's identity to sell some records. Like Back In Black that followed, both are perfectly crafted, ass-kicking rock albums, the production doesn't date and only helps highlight their quality.

 

Highway to Hell feels crisp. The playing is precise and on point, the band is a finely honed team. The songs also have a focus that their previous albums lack. The album sounds like a band that has managed to refine its rough edges. And their roots keep them embedded with a bluesy feel that grounds the record, even though the sound is bigger than before.

Def Leppard and the bands that followed sound slick. They rock, but rarely do they roll. The bluesy elements are essentially gone, in favor of the big rock sound.

So yes, I can see how Highway to Hell contained elements that would later get expanded upon with bands like Def Leppard, but I think there's a significant different in the ultimate feel of the music and I think Rich nailed a lot of what makes Pyromania a full on hair metal album versus something like Highway to Hell.

I don't think AC/DC ever made a record that would be considered full on hair metal. They were always a little too removed from that.