Photo: WENN
AC/DC have opened up about Malcolm Young's dementia, revealing the guitarist showed signs of dementia in 2008.
Speaking to The Guardian, Angus Young explained the band were worried about Malcolm throughout the recording of their 2008 album Black Ice, particularly due to his ill health at the time, with the group even considering not doing the album.
Young explained: “He was not well when we went to do Black Ice: his symptoms of dementia were starting then, and he got through it,"
"I had said to him, even before we did the album, ‘Are you sure you want to do this? I have to know that you really want to do it.’ He was the one who said: ‘Yes! We’ve really got to do it.’"
Angus Young continued to explain that other worrying signs came when the guitarist was having to relearn his parts before live shows, something he hadn't needed to do in the past: "It was hard work for him. He was relearning a lot of those songs that he knew backwards; the ones we were playing that night he’d be relearning."
“Sometimes you would look and he’d be there. And you’d have a really great day and he’d be Malcolm again. And other times, his mind was going. But he still held it together. He’d still get on the stage. Some nights he played and you’d think: ‘Does he know where he is?’ But he got through.”
Malcolm Young left the group earlier this year, stepping down due to poor health.
AC/DC will release their new album Rock or Bust next Monday (1 December), it will be their first record without Malcolm Young in the band's 41 year history.
