Nail the ToneAC/DC

Back In Black

AC/DC · Back In Black · 1980

The riff is Malcolm Young's stripped-down Gretsch Jet Firebird into a cranked Marshall on the left and Angus's SG Standard into a Super Lead/JTM50 on the right, tracked live with the band at Compass Point. There are no effects on the rhythm tracks — the dirt is all power tubes and speakers pushed to the edge, mic'd with Neumann U 67s and U 87s and printed flat. Keep the gain low so the front edge of every chord stays audible, cut the bass a little, park presence near zero, and get the volume from the amp rather than a pedal.

Where these numbers come from: worked out from the documented rig and the sound of the record

Tuning

Standard tuning, no capo

Standard E tuning; the riff is two guitars in near-unison cut live — Malcolm's Gretsch panned left, Angus's SG panned right — so one player should split the difference between the cleaner and dirtier tone.

Part: Riff

Guitar

  • Gretsch G6131 Jet Firebird (1963, "The Beast") · Gretsch Filter'Tron · bridge pickup (only pickup fitted)
  • Gibson SG Standard (1971) · Gibson T-Top humbuckers · bridge pickup

Amp

Marshall 1992 Super Bass 100W head + 4x12

GAIN
8.0
BASS
4.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
6.0
PRESENCE
0.0

Malcolm's left-channel rhythm amp; Platt mixed and matched 50- and 100-watt heads song to song, turning each up "until the cabinets were biting." Guitar World reports that for the 1978-80 albums Malcolm may instead have used a Marshall 2203 master-volume head, and Equipboard lists a JTM45 and a Super Lead at these sessions.

Amp

Marshall 1959 Super Lead 100W head + 4x12

GAIN
7.0
BASS
5.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
6.0
PRESENCE
0.0

Angus's right-channel amp; a rare Marshall JTM50 was also in rotation at Compass Point (often misreported as a JTM45). Cabinets were loaded with Celestion G12-65s and captured with two Neumann U 67/U 87s on different speakers, no compression.

Pedals

  • Schaffer-Vega Diversity System · wireless unit used as a preamp/compander · Per Platt, used on the overdubbed solo (and the rhythm after it), not on the basic tracking; it added midrange bite

Tone character

low-gain Marshall crunch · forward mids, tight lows · chimey pick attack · dry, no compression · power-amp and speaker breakup · wide two-guitar spread

easy

Open-position E, D and A power-chord shapes are easy to fret, but the riff lives on syncopation and silence — the rests have to be choked off cleanly and the pull-off fill at the end of the phrase has to sit exactly in the pocket.

Want this on your own amp?

These are the record's settings. Tell us what you play through and we'll translate every knob to the amp you actually own — free.

Adapt it to my gear

Sources