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Angus Young’s opinion on Stevie Young as Malcolm’s replacement
Brothers Malcolm and Angus Young were the backbone of AC/DC from 1973 to 2014 when Malcolm had to step down due to his battle with dementia, which ultimately led to his death in 2017 at the age of 64. His replacement was a member of the family, their nephew Stevie Young, and his uncle Angus has talked about him a couple of times, giving his opinion on his playing.
What is Angus Young’s opinion on Stevie Young as Malcolm’s replacement
Angus Young not only likes Stevie Young as his nephew but also admires him a lot as a guitar player, considering him the closest thing to his late brother Malcolm Young you can get. “Stevie grew up playing like Mal. That was how he really got into getting his guitar together. So he just tuned in to how Mal would play. It is a unique style. Because there’s a lot of guitarists out there, like myself, who play a lot of lead notes, and they try to be flashy and stuff.”
“So finding somebody who’s just a solid guy on the rhythm guitar and plays it with such a distinct style, they’re very rare and unique. You only get a handful of those type of players in the world. So that’s the style Stevie aimed for. Malcolm had his own thing going, very distinct. It’s just a unique way of playing. Stevie, that’s what his bible was and he filled in for Mal in 1988.”
He continued:
“It was Mal who got him in. ‘He’ll help while I go on and get myself in rehab.’ He had been gigging in his own bands for a while. He came in and did a great job. So it was really obvious, if you were gonna look anywhere, I’d get Stevie in first. Because of just that style of playing,” Angus Young told Chris Jericho in 2020.
Stevie is the son of Stephen Crawford Young, the eldest brother of the Young family. Like his brothers, he emigrated from Scotland to Sydney with his family in 1963 when he was still a child. But he ended up returning to his home country in 1970, three years before AC/DC was formed. Although he is Angus’ and Malcolm’s nephew, Stevie is about the same age as them, having been born in 1956, one year after Angus and three years after Malcolm. They have been friends since they were kids and even attended the same school while growing up in Sydney, Aus
Angus Young said Malcolm would be the first one to say Stevie was the best one to replace him
Malcolm himself recognized that Stevie was the perfect man to replace him in the band and as Angus once said, his brother would be the first to say so if asked. “Stevie had filled in for Malcolm once around in 1988 when Malcolm had heavy alcohol problems and he wanted to get it under control. Malcolm had to stop touring, to try to fix (his problem), get some rehabilitation to help with him.”
“He was the one who suggested at the time to get Stevie to finish the tour. So Stevie had worked with AC/DC before and he is like a second Malcolm, he plays that style. Malcolm is unable to do that role anymore (he was still alive back then). Stevie was the obvious person to do that role. He is a very good guitarist, he knows all the AC/DC songs and also the new ones, after working on the new album (‘Rock or Bust’ at the time).” During the same conversation he was asked if the tour would be difficult without Malcolm.
He said:
“Well, Stevie is there doing that role, he’s about the best we can get for Malcolm. He is the one (who comes) closer and Malcolm would be the first to tell you. Stevie is the best you can use to do that role,” he said in an interview with Rock FM in 2014 (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).
The only thing about his nephew that bothers Angus is that he is taller than him, so he has to look up to talk to him. “Stevie is a great player. (It was emotionally hard for me) because Malcolm has always been my older brother. He is like Brian (Johnson), got his own character, very strong (character). Stevie is a bit the same, (but) Stevie is a lot taller than me. So I have to look up (to talk to him) (laughs),” he said in an interview with Absolute Radio in 2014.
Stevie and his brother Frase would travel with AC/DC occasionally during the tours when they were younger. Both of them were photographed with their uncles in the 1970s during those trips. As Angus said, it was in 1988, during the American tour to promote “Blow Up Your Video”, that he ended up replacing his uncle for the first time. Curiously his son is called Angus, like his famous uncle, and also is a musician, who was briefly a member of the tribute band AC/DC UK.
Stevie Young said that his goal is to preserve the spirit of Malcolm when he plays
“My dad played accordion. He had a guitar lying around in the house and I was always just picking it up. I tried the accordion but it was huge and I was only about 10. So I used to get my brother pulling on one end of it. I was playing it like a keyboard. That never really worked out. I come from a musical family. My dad and all of his brothers played instruments.”
“Parties were always good when we were kids, non-stop music. So there was always instruments knocking around. You picked it up and played away. There was always people to show you how to get on with it. I listen and try to find bits that I’ve missed or something that Malcolm did that would help with what’s going in the tunes. I’m not trying to imitate or copy him.”
“(I am) trying to keep the spirit of what he did in the band,” he said on their Youtube channel. During the same video, AC/DC’s guitar tech said that Stevie plays so hard that he usually breaks the guitar pick in every song he plays. The guitarist then said: “The picks are usually destroyed. They don’t make them as they used to (laughs)”.
Brian Johnson said that Malcolm told the band to keep going and making music
Even when dementia started to affect him, according to Brian Johnson, Malcolm kept telling the band to keep going and making music. “Malcolm did say and when Malcolm says things you usually listen, I’m not kidding. He said: ‘Keep making music’. He knew what was happening to him, he knew, he’s the hardest man I’ve ever met in my life.”
“I’m talking hard, the straightest shooter I’ve ever talked to in my life. He didn’t stand fools gladly, he just said what he meant. So when he said, it usually meant a lot. (…) (Stevie) worked his tail off in the studio to make sure he did it right. He wanted right, he’s a bit like Malcolm, a very straight lad,” Brian Johnson told Loudwire in 2014.
Although Stevie is almost the same age as Angus and Malcolm, he started his musical career much later in life, only in 1979, when he started playing in bands in Scotland. Some of them were called The Stabbers, Prowler, Tantrum and Starfighters, which was formed in 1980 in Birmingham, England and had the chance to be AC/DC’s opening act during their “Back in Black” tour in the United Kingdom. Two years later they also were the opening band for Ozzy Osbourne. The group disbanded in 1983, returning briefly in 1987.
Not long after the guitarist formed Little Big Horn, which had a demo tape produced by Malcolm and then Up Rising, but both failed to get a record deal. A few years before being invited to replace Malcolm, he was a member of Helsarockin, group formed in Birmingham.
