{"id":792445,"date":"2019-01-28T09:00:17","date_gmt":"2019-01-28T16:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=785246"},"modified":"2019-01-28T09:00:17","modified_gmt":"2019-01-28T16:00:17","slug":"bon-scotts-1978-letter-on-money-drinking-touring-heads-to-auction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/music-news\/bon-scotts-1978-letter-on-money-drinking-touring-heads-to-auction\/","title":{"rendered":"Bon Scott\u2019s 1978 Letter \u2013 on Money, Drinking, Touring \u2013 Heads to Auction"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Bon Scott<\/a>, the late AC\/DC<\/a> singer who fronted the band from 1974 to 1980, vents about financial struggles, hard drinking and the band\u2019s grueling tour schedule in a handwritten August 1978 letter headed to auction. The note, addressed to his sister Valerie and set to start at a $6,000 bid, will be sold January 31st via Nate D. Sanders Auctions in Los Angeles, California.<\/span><\/p>\n

Scott wrote the letter during a stop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania during the U.S. tour promoting their fifth LP, Powerage<\/em>. He details the Australian hard rock band\u2019s whirlwind live run \u2013\u00a0including a spot on the TV show The Midnight Special<\/em> and recording the live LP If You Want Blood (You\u2019ve Got It) \u2013<\/em> and alludes to the mental health struggles of \u201cPhil.\u201d (While the note doesn\u2019t specify \u201cPhil\u201d\u2018s last name, the band\u2019s drummer at the time was Phil Rudd.)<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve just come over from the west coast where I spent a couple of days in L.A. doing Midnight Special,\u201d he writes. \u201cI went to see Doug\u2019s new band the other night playing a place called La Cantino El Paso which is down Long Beach & boy he had me in stitches. He\u2019s playing really well & singing like a bird. Don\u2019t know if he told you but I rang him a few weeks ago to see if he would fill in for Phillip for a while as Phil had a bit of a nervous breakdown & had to spend a lot of time with a shrink. It was really bad but luckily he got over it quickly enough not to upset the band. We had to treat him with kid gloves for a bit but he\u2019s ok now.\u201d
<\/span><\/p>\n

The singer apologizes for being \u201cpretty slack when it comes to letters & phone calls,\u201d admitting, \u201cI\u2019m always travelling or drunk or hungover or\u2026or\u2026today I\u2019m shaking so much I can hardly write.\u201d He also reveals he had to stop making calls \u201cwhen I got too much in the red with the money situation,\u201d adding, \u201cI\u2019m already about $130 into this weeks wages but about two weeks ago I owed the band about $70 on pay day & that\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBut being crazy is about the only way to keep my sanity if you know what I mean,\u201d continues Scott, who fronted AC\/DC for six studio albums and one live LP before his death in February 1980. \u201cWe\u2019ve worked so much since I saw you last that it\u2019s all one hell of a blur. Must have been across the country & up & down it a million times & I\u2019m beggining [sic] to feel & look just a little haggard. I\u2019d love to check myself in to a sanitarium for a month but after this tour it\u2019s straight to Europe & England for a month & then back here for the winter-end of the year so the next time you see me it might be in a geriatric ward. My hair looks like a busby but I\u2019m just going to let it go on growing & be a hippy again for a while.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Scott acknowledges that he\u2019s happy, despite the hardships. \u201cI\u2019m not complaining cause there\u2019s always good times & we\u2019re selling lots of records & making people happy so it can\u2019t be all that bad. I\u2019m going to go home to Mums at the end of the year & spend a month on the beach before tearing into it all again. Oh we finished our live album a few weeks ago in New York. I had to re-record about five concerts cause the vocals were not as good sound wise as the[y] had to be from all the michrophone [sic] spill from the guitars & things. I was allright (ahem) it sounds great & it\u2019ll look good hanging on the Xmas trees.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Additional information about the letter is available at the Nate D. Sanders website<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bon Scott, the late AC\/DC singer who fronted the band from 1974 to 1980, vents about financial struggles, hard drinking and the band\u2019s grueling tour schedule in a handwritten August 1978 letter headed to auction. The note, addressed to his sister Valerie and set to start at a $6,000 bid, will be sold January 31st […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-792445","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-13 01:26:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/792445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=792445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/792445\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=792445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=792445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=792445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}