"Angus Young is a genius"

AC/DC are on the promotional treadmill promoting their world tour, and Angus Young and singer Brian Johnson have been talking about their own talents to The New Zealand Herald.

Founder member and guitarist Angus Young acclaims the work of producer Brendan O'Brien (Springsteen, Pearl Jam) on Black Ice, saying: "He was trying to recapture more of that rock sound, like the Highway To Hell - he said he even liked the Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap time.

"It has to sound like AC/DC. You want fans to hear that and go, 'That's AC/DC'. But you also want them to hear it and go, 'But it's AC/DC playing something new'.

"That for us is always the challenge. You hope that your songwriting, the way that you're doing it is getting better."

"Critics are all dead wrong"

And after a staggering 2008 for AC/DC - when Black Ice debuted at Number 1 in 29 countries - singer Brian Johnson reckons it's time for some acclaim.

Johnson adds: "The critics have always been a little flippant with AC/DC about Angus and the school suit, and it's always easy to have a quick little joke or a dig at the expense of it, the easy riffs, and such and such, and they're all dead wrong. The easiest riffs in the world are the hardest ones to write, because they are very few.

"Highway To Hell is 'easy', but you ask a guitarist, it's not that easy. Nobody can write them because easy things are very difficult to write… and to put them together in different computations and to come up with something fresh and different.

"It's genius, but the critics never figure that out."

So: are AC/DC still genius? Are the riffs on Black Ice really holding up against Highway To Hell and other Angus classics? Comment below...