I hope every single one of you, my beloved readers, have already heard this news by the time you sit down to read this. But, for those of you who haven’t — let it be known — AC/DC will be touring our planet once again, beginning on October 28, 2008!!!

The miraculous power of rock and roll has been, is, and will always be found in the indescribable way that a heavily distorted power chord banged out on the six strings of an electric guitar can somehow preserve, energize, and inspire an adolescent naiveté — a pure rebellion against all rule and conformity. Then launch any man, woman, and/or child out into the frontier of infinite possibilities with no regard or concern for social, cultural, personal, or political impediments that may stand in their way.

What I’m speaking of here is an ever-elusive mystery that I’ll gladly spend the rest of my waking days trying to figure out. It is this very mystery that put the swivel in Elvis’s hips, eyeliner on Little Richard, and guided the guitar pick and fingers of Chuck Berry. And it is this same unfathomable mystery that somehow can transform a frail, hyper-active, (by all appearances) unstable human being dressed up in a schoolboy outfit, rabidly stomping across the stage and wielding a guitar like a meat-cleaver while a hairy-chested, middle-aged fellow mercilessly scrapes and tears his vocal chords “for those about to rock” into maybe the coolest, most rock and roll experience we can see or hear at this point in human history.

AC/DC is a rock and roll band, plain and simple. Between the brothers Angus and Malcolm Young, Brian Johnson, Cliff Williams, and Phil Rudd, we have an ear-splitting reminder that the power of rock and roll transcends any limitations that culture, fashion, or economics may try to set against it.

All that said, AC/DC has deemed this year appropriate to put a new album out there for us, entitled Black Ice (in stores on September 19^th), and then jackhammer it into our skulls with a subsequent world tour. It seems, these days, rock and roll bands (or what’s left of them) are all busy clambering over each other to clothespin a “message” or “cause” on the sleeve of their music or image. We are (or at least I am) in desperate need of a band to cast image and worry aside, turn up their Marshall stacks, and scream from the rooftops that, in these dark days of international fear and economic uncertainty, when your gas bill is as much as your rent and at any moment the whole of human history could take a nosedive for the worse, “Rock and Roll will survive!”

I can’t think of a more appropriate time and place for AC/DC than right now.

Here are the U.S. dates (with international dates soon to follow):

October 28th - Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania - Wachovia Arena

October 30th -  Chicago, Illinois - Allstate Arena

November 3rd - Indianapolis, Indiana - Conseco Fieldhouse

November 5th - Detroit, Michigan - Palace of Auburn Hills

November 7th - Toronto, Ontario - Rogers Centre

November 9th - Boston, Massachusetts - TD Banknorth Garden

November 12th - New York, New York - Madison Square Garden

November 13th - New York, New York - Madison Square Garden

November 15th - Washington, D.C. - Verizon Center

November 17th - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - Wachovia Center

November 19th - East Rutherford, New Jersey - IZOD Center

November 21st - Columbus, Ohio - Schottenstein Center

November 23rd - Minneapolis, Minnesota - Xcel Energy Center

November 25th - Denver, Colorado - Pepsi Center

November 28th - Vancouver, British Columbia - General Motors Place

November 29th - Seattle, Washington - Key Arena

November 30th - Tacoma, Washington - Tacoma Dome

December 2nd - Oakland, California - ORACLE Arena

December 6th - Los Angeles, California - The Forum

December 10th - Phoenix, Arizona - US Airways Center

December 12th - San Antonio, Texas - AT&T Center

December 14th - Houston, Texas - Toyota Center

December 16th - Atlanta, Georgia - Philips Arena

December 18th - Charlotte, North Carolina - Time Warner Cable Arena

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