'Highway to hell' comes from a toilet session

Adam Young explained the origin of the song

Maybe it’s true that all good ideas come when we are in the toilet. It’s the case of the song “Highway to hell” by AC/DC, the famous hard rock band from Sydney (Australia) formed in 1973.

Angus Young, the legendary guitarist of the band, explained the making of the record during an interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe where he said that the premise for the song came while he was having a toilet break.

“We’d been in Miami, and we’d been in a rehearsal room and that’s what we were doing. We were putting together new tracks and we’d been there a couple of weeks and we were going a bit slow. And then I had come in one day with Malcolm [his brother] and just before we got in, I said, ‘I’ve got a good idea in my head'”, said Angus Young.

“So I got in and he came in, and I started playing the beginning, the intro. And so I was doing the da-da-da, da-da-da. And then I said to Malcolm… I had this thing about the drums. And I said, ’I just want it to come in in the right spot’. And he said, ’Okay’. Malcolm got behind the drums and he said, ‘Right, you let me know when you hear the downbeat, the first downbeat of what you want’. So that’s what I did. I said, ‘I’ll do my drop’, and he said, ’And I’ll follow your foot’. So he came in with the beat. That’s how we set it up”.

Then he explained that the music was there but not the lyrics, so Angus said that Malcolm then asked him if he could come up with something.

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“I said, ’Okay, give me a few minutes'”, Young recalled. ”And I went to the toilet, and then I was in the toilet and I was there and I’m sitting and thinking. And I’m just sitting on the throne more or less. And then I go, ’I think I’ve got it. I’ve got it. I’ve got it. I’ve got the idea in my head'”.

“And then I came in there and I said, ‘I’ve got it. Highway to hell’. And I was over the chords that we had tried out through a chorus. And he went, ‘Yeah, that’ll work’. And he said, ‘If we spread it out a bit into full singing thing’. So he came up with a spread of it, ‘[singing] Highway to hell'”.

There’s no doubt that the loo is always a great source of inspiration.