DUBLIN MONSTERS OF ROCK

O2 Arena, Dublin April 18, 2009

SETLIST

1. Rock'n'roll Train
2. Hell ain't a bad place to be
3. Back in Black
4. Big Jack
5. Dirty Deeds
6. Shot Down in Flames
7. Thunderstruck
8. Black Ice
9. The Jack
10. Hell's Bells
11. Shoot to Thrill
12. War Machine
13. Anything Goes
14. You Shook Me All Night Long
15. TNT
16. Whole Lotta Rosie
17. Let there be Rock
18. Highway to Hell

19. For Those About to Rock

AC/DC ABRUZZO OFFICIAL REPORT

In Dublin AC/DC Abruzzo got what it was looking for: a great dose of pure, tough, sweaty, wild rock'n'roll with a roaring rock'n'roll crowd. The Dublin O2 arena proved to be an ideal venue for a rock show: it reminded us of the Hammersmith Apollo Theatre in London, with a relatively small semicircular standing section with seats above it, just like a gallery in a theatre. The crowd was definitely one of the best of the entire tour, jumping, screaming, singing, dancing etc. Great security staff this time. AC/DC Abruzzo learned a new word in Dublin, “to mosh”, which was marked on the tickets in the following sentence “No crowdsurfing/No moshing". Apparently, nobody took it too seriously; actually, a lot of people did the exact opposite! We witnessed constant crowdsurfing going on in the standing section where we were, perfectly executed, almost artistically, with people surfing back and forth during the show. During For Those about to Rock we lost count of the crowdsurfers: apparently everybody was waiting for this song just like the perfect wave!

Everybody seemed to have a wonderful time, including the band. Brian was in very good shape, and looked very inspired. Angus looks younger and faster at every show. He must have signed a pact with the Devil or, maybe, it is the Devil that signed a pact with him!!! AH AH AH AH

The other boys are just real rock'n'roll marines. Everything looked in perfect "working order". A lethal War Machine of Rock'n'Roll! 

It’s hard to find the highlight of the night; probably the first 3 songs. The crowd was so energetic and loud that even the band looked surprised. We were pleasantly surprised too. Maybe it was the Guinnes, maybe the Irish temper/attitude or maybe the fact that they were giving energy drinks for free outside the O2 (we did love the idea actually!). Or maybe the three factors combined. Anyway we probably would put the Dublin show just after Paris, Milan and Barcelona although we have to wait the end of the arena tour to start with our official AC/DC Abruzzo rankings.

Another good reason to rock in Dublin was the presence of our rocking friends from AC/DC Italia,Kapri and Marcom. And their flag! KETTAFFATTO?? We salute you!

See you in Manchester.

EXCLUSIVE VIDEO FROM AC/DC ITALIA IN PARTNERSHIP WITH AC/DC ABRUZZO

AC/DC ABRUZZO'S PROVERB OF THE MONTH

La Pruvedènze chiude 'na finéstre e aàpre nu bbalecòne

ENGLISH TRANSLATION

When one door closes, a bigger one opens

DUBLIN!!!

What a great night for rock'n'roll!! The Dublin show was absolutely brilliant!! Fantastic crowd and wonderful venue. One of the best of the entire European tour! We salute the IRISH! And we thank all the fans who came to say hello before and after the show showing their support for "Project AC/DC Abruzzo". Big grazie also to those who helped us to solve the ticket problem! ;-)

Report coming soon!

O2 Arena, London April 16, 2009

ANGUS "ON FIRE"!

O2 Arena, London April 16, 2009

SETLIST

1. Rock'n'roll Train
2. Hell ain't a bad place to be
3. Back in Black
4. Big Jack
5. Dirty Deeds
6. Shot Down in Flames
7. Thunderstruck
8. Black Ice
9. The Jack
10. Hell's Bells
11. Shoot to Thrill
12. War Machine
13. Anything Goes
14. You Shook Me All Night Long
15. TNT
16. Whole Lotta Rosie
17. Let there be Rock
18. Highway to Hell

19. For Those About to Rock

AC/DC ABRUZZO OFFICIAL REPORT

Another show under the belt for AC/DC Abruzzo. 17 shows so far. Not bad at all. But we still want more!

SCHOOL DAYS

However, London left us with mixed feelings. Someone once said AC/DC represented "the ultimate middle finger aimed at the establishment..."! AC/DC Abruzzo fully understood the strong aversion to all sort of imposed codes of conduct and stupid etiquette in the London O2 arena when facing all sorts of ridiculous warnings, public announcements, semantically empty sentences and weird pseudo-nazi behaviours by the staff and security guys all of which are totally inappropriate for a rock'n'roll show. Especially after seeing AC/DC play in 10 different countries. Maybe they are good for Michael Jackson, but definetely ot for AC/DC.

We will skip the details. The O2 arena in London was just the polished and refined version of what we saw in Prague (O2 arena too) where they actually used airport scanners for each single bag and person. No kidding. And dozens of security managers everywhere wearing a suit and headphones, a beautidul mixture of Star Trek and James Bond movies...

Ok, times have changed and we know that even rock'n'roll is now a victim of this corporate bullshit and anti-terrorism crap mixed with UK anti-hooligan policies but hey, we're talking about an AC/DC show here, the same AC/DC show we saw in Paris, Milan or Barcelona where everybody seemed to have a fucking great time without being hurt.

When in Rome do as the Roman do

Actually no. We did as the Abruzzeses do. And it worked pretty well! We rocked the way we wanted and we showed our flag during The Jack and Let There Be Rock, as usual. Even if they had told us not to show our flag inside the venue ('Ngulammamet!).

We had a great time! We were just disappointed about seeing how calm and quiet was the London crowd. Even during TNT. People in the seats actually looked bored!! We must confess we had high expectations for this show, especially after being at the Hammersmith gig in 2003. Maybe too high. Something in the same league as Paris, Milan or Barcelona. Probably it was just the consequence of the ball breaking security policies we mentioned above.

Apart from that we got another excellent performance by the band. Ok, Brian fucked up during the Jack (we are sure it was because of the headphones problem he has as he told us in Stockholm) but he was just great for the whole show. We just loved how Angus immediately took control of the situation, stepped in and gave a cue to Brian to come out of the empasse. What a professional!!

We have to admit that the British crowd does love Whole Lotta Rosie (just the first part, at least) during which they screamed very loud. Brian made us sing "when it comes to lovin'" both nights. They also seem to like Let There Be Rock a lot too, when there was some serious jumping and some crowd surfing in our section (2 brave surfers).

R'n'R (Tube) Train

As we wrote in the previous post we seriously ran the risk not to go to the show this time! When we were supposed to take the metro to go to the O2 arena the Jubilee line stopped working and we got stuck at Canada Water, more than 2 hours walking from the venue. All the buses were full and no chance of finding an empty cab... So, after a few minutes of panic, we made the decision to improvise some old-school hitchhicking showing our inseparable Italian flag and guess what? IT DID WORK! A guy (Andy) made his cab driver stop and took us and another guy, Mark, onboard. During the ride to the O2 arena Andy told us about his first AC/DC concert in Donnington in 1984 while Mark told us about his passion for lasagne and PERONI beer!!! Peroni, Peroni, Peroni!!! Ah ah ah.

We salute you.

MIXED FEELINGS

BRAIANNO!

WITH PATRICK WHO WAS WITH US IN HAMMERSMITH IN 2003

HIGHWAY TO HELL by Vince (friend of ours AKA The French painter AKA Dirty shoes)

TUBE TRAIN (Running right off the track)

AC/DC Abruzzo has just come back from the O2 arena. Great performance. Disappointing crowd. But we got our dose of rock'n'roll for today and we will sleep well tonight.

But it was quite a difficult task to reach the O2 arena. The Jubilee Line went down at around 7pm (apparently for a Train that ran off the track!!!). No buses and all the cabs were taken. We spent about an hour trying to work out something.  When everything seemed to be lost we were saved by the Gods of Rock'n'roll (and by our stubborn Abruzzese attitude as well as by our flag!)! We arrived at 8.30, just 15 minutes before the beginning of the show. The rest is history! FREKET NGUL!

Pics, videos and report coming soon. In the meantime here's an exclusive 2-cam mix video from London first night. Thanks to the Vice President Andrea who took care of the editing in our General Headquarters in Città Sant'Angelo, the City of Angels of Abruzzo.

PS FREKET 'NGUL means "it's alright, 'ngul" 

AH AH AH AH

HELL IN THE O2 ARENA!

LONDON AIN'T A BAD PLACE TO BE

O2 Arena, London April 14, 2009 

SETLIST

1. Rock'n'roll Train
2. Hell ain't a bad place to be
3. Back in Black
4. Big Jack
5. Dirty Deeds
6. Shot Down in Flames
7. Thunderstruck
8. Black Ice
9. The Jack
10. Hell's Bells
11. Shoot to Thrill
12. War Machine
13. Anything Goes
14. You Shook Me All Night Long
15. TNT
16. Whole Lotta Rosie
17. Let there be Rock
18. Highway to Hell

19. For Those About to Rock

AC/DC ABRUZZO OFFICIAL REPORT

London! This is the place where AC/DC Abruzzo's President and Secretary General had their first AC/DC epiphany. It was 20th October 2003, the day we heard Gone Shootin' live for the first time. We were in the Hammersmith Theatre attending the AC/DC soundcheck. A second epiphany took place the day after, during If You Want Blood (You've Got It). We will never forget that song and the way it was performed in that legendary theatre. Since that day our AC/DC madness began!

This time it was the turn of the O2 Arena. We were positively impressed by this venue. Despite it is very big it still has a certain amount of intimacy which is good for rock shows, especially in the front of stage section and the first level of seats. The highest level, on the contrary, it looks like the San Siro Stadium in Milan. Acoustics seem pretty good though.



We had reserved seats on Malcolm's side. Excellent seats, but you already know what we think about reserved seats at an AC/DC show. They just go against the entire idea of rock’n’roll! Actually, a suitable metaphor came out today during a discussion with some other fans (Vince and Owen) who share our view. Being forced to stay seated in your seat during an AC/DC concert or it's like being forced to have sex in a position that you hate without having the permission to come... A real nightmare…

But this time we had to cope with the situation and took it with philosophy. We felt like watching a live DVD or videobootleg with 20,000 people and a very good PA system… So we took advantage of our position to contemplate this wonderful rock’n'roll show from a different angle. Also, we had the opportunity to admire Malcolm from a closer position…

We skipped again The Answer. Not our type of rock'n'roll, that's official. We arrived at 8.20. Ten minutes before the start and half of the seats were still empty. During the intro video we still have goose bumps, especially when the R'n’R train comes out of the tunnel.

We were a bit disappointed with the reaction of the London crowd. Just some quite jumping in the front rows during R'n'R Train. And most people standing still in most of the GA section… Things got a bit better later during the last part of the show (WLR and LTBR) but the English definitely cannot be ranked among the best crowds of this tour.

Angus was in amazing shape. Hey, even physically it looked like he had been working out recently!! We spent several songs observing him in all his moves! What a rocker!! By the way he wore a new black and white tie never seen before (sold with the official merchandise too). Brian looked a bit slow during the first 3-4 songs. Then he got back in action, full throttle. His voice is not as melodic as at the beginning of the tour, but hey, try to sing the way he sings 4 nights a week for 2 hours!!!



Malcolm in action is just pure Rock’n’roll bliss. We love his back ground vocals, especially in Thunderstruck and Dirty Deeds. He moves back and forth with the accuracy of a Swiss clockwork. We really would kill to hear If you Want Blood's riff from Malcolm’s guitar before the end of this tour… Cliff and Phil, impeccable as usual.



Best songs of the show: Dirty Deeds, Shoot To Thrill, Let There be Rock and Highway to Hell (video coming soon).
Interestengly, at the entrance they asked us not to show our flag… It must be some sort of O2 strange policy (remember Prague?). Tomorrow, however, we’ll be back in our spot in the standing section and the AC/DC Abruzzo flag will fly high again!!!

SALUTE

AC/DC THUNDERSTRUCK IN LONDON - ANGUS CAM!!!!

Here's a little "antipasto" for you... An exclusive video of THUNDERSTRUCK live in London April 14 2009 (Angus cam!) from our YOUTUBE Channel. Angus at his best!!!
See you in Camden Town!!!