In 1975, AC/DC were still waiting for a breakthrough. They’d found their singer in Bon Scott a few months previously, but manager Michael Browning thought they needed another injection of fresh impetus. It was his decision to relocate the band from Sydney to Melbourne, a few hundred miles south. It was a sink or swim situation: a tough band now in the middle of a tough city with its own clique of local, hard-nosed groups.
The first test came when Browning booked the group onto the bill on the Sunbury festival. Taking place on the outskirts of Melbourne and with 45,000 people in attendance, it was billed as Australia’s answer to Woodstock. There wasn’t much peace and love in the air, though. Due to take to the stage in the early hours after headliners Deep Purple’s set, AC/DC found out that the stage had been stripped of all their gear. Browning saw it as fighting talk, and gave Scott and the Young brothers licence to attack.
