The Bee Gees and AC/DC Mashup I Never Imagined Would Work, and the Curious Relationship Between Disco and Rock

On the surface, the Bee Gees and AC/DC would never make sense together, musically, but one clever mashup perfectly paired AC/DC‘s “Back in Black” and the Bee Gees classic “Stayin’ Alive” in disco-rock harmony. Aptly named “Stayin’ in Black,” the medley was originally released in 2010 and is one of many pairings created by Wax Audio, founded by Australian audio and video producer Tom Compagnoni.

The company is also behind dozens of other mashups featuring Lady Gaga and Judas Priest, Metallica and Herbie Hancock, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, Van Halen and Michael Jackson, and more. Blending the Bee Gees “Stayin’ Alive” and AC/DC’s “Back in Black” is not natural at all—but it works with Angus Young’s “Back in Black” riffs replacing the original arrangement behind the Bee Gees’ 1977 hit.

Aside from the iconic status of the Bee Gees and AC/DC songs that were mixed, both have also held up, rather mightily, on their own for more than 40 years. What makes this melange even more significant is that, though both were released within only three years from one another “Stayin’ Alive” for the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and “Back in Black” in 1980—a turning point for the band with then-new vocalist Brian Johnson—they were completely clashing genres at the time.

[RELATED: 11 Songs the Bee Gees Wrote That Were Made Famous by Other Artists]

“Disco Sucks”

Disco slithered into a decade spilling over with the glammed-up rock of David Bowie, T. Rex, Slade, Roxy Music, the emergence of country outlaws, and explosion of funk, and soul, disco was somewhat of an outlier by the late 1970s. Marked by a growing sentiment by some of “Disco Sucks,” a term coined by Detroit DJ Steve Dahl, the “Dancing Queen” genre was starting to lose steam by the end of the decade after it became overly mainstream but mostly because of those opposing its popularity and representation amongst Blacks, Latinos, gays, and females.

In the early ’70s, disco was on top of the world with the Bee Gees, ABBA, Donna Summer, Sister Sledge, KC and the Sunshine Band, Chic, Gloria Gaynor, and so many more. And the Bee Gees had a last hurrah with Saturday Night Fever before the dancing craze dissipated and there was a backlash against the genre.

The “Disco Sucks” movement also came to a climax on July 12, 1979, when a Major League Baseball promotion, which was led by Dahl, Disco Demolition Night and involved detonating a dumpster-full of disco albums, ended in a riot at Comiskey Park in Chicago, Illinois. After the records were destroyed, the explosion and rioters damaged the playing field beyond repair, forcing the White Sox to forfeit the second game. The event has also been referred to the day disco died.

Within rock, disco was rarely up for deliberation. Earlier in AC/DC’s career, their label suggested the band experiment with a disco sound. “We literally had record company people asking us for a disco hit,” said AC/DC guitarist Angus Young. In response, Young said the band did what they knew best. “We gave them ‘Highway to Hell,’” their final album featuring singer Bon Scott.

[RELATED: Bagpipes, Farm Tools, a Buddhist Monk: 7 Covers of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck”]

Metal and Hard Rock Crossover

AC/DC used Highway to Hell to push off any disco advance, but some artists were open to the idea catching a more mainstream hit, and some within rock weren’t entirely allergic to the genre. Before its demise, the Rolling Stones experimented with disco on their 1978 album Some Girls and “Miss You.” That year, the Grateful Dead also offered up their own psychedelic twist of disco on “Shakedown Street.” A year later, KISS had another hit with the disco-dipped “I Was Made for Lovin’ You.” Released on the band’s 1979 album Dynasty, the song went to No. 1 in several countries and peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100.

By 1980, Paul McCartney released the more disco-leaning “Goodnight Tonight” with Wings as one-off single, and more than three decades later Foo Fighters released their tribute to disco and the Bee Gees as the Dee Gees with their 2021 album Hail Satin.

Photo: The Bee Gees (Steve Schapiro/Corbis via Getty Images)