Brian Johnson Joins Slash on Stage

Slash was joined by the singer of the AC/DCBrian Johnson at the inaugural Sky Arts Awards ceremony at the Roundhouse in London to perform “Killing Floor”the cover of Howlin’ Wolf included in “Orgy Of The Damned” (read here the review), the latest blues-inspired album by the guitarist of Guns N’ Roses released last May. The album features not only Brian Johnson but also the frontman of AerosmithSteven Tyler to the harmonica.

Regarding how he convinced Johnson and Tyler to participate in
“Killing Floor”
,
Slash
at the time
of the album’s release in an interview with Steve Migs

he explained: “That’s a good question.

I had the song and I was trying to think who would be good at it. And Brian came to mind. And I’ve known Brian for a long time now. And he’s got that great grit in his voice. I called him up and it turns out he’s a Howlin’ Wolf protégé. And he’d been in covers bands before AC/DC, and before Geordie. And also, he told me he’s putting together a kind of blues orchestra at the moment. So he was keen to do that particular song. And that’s the key thing when you go and call one of these great artists if you have a cover that you’d like to do if they’d be willing to do it: the song has to speak to them, it has to mean something to them too, not just me. And that was the case with Brian. Then Steven Tyler came in. He came into my studio after Brian had already sung. He came in to play harmonica, or he just had a harmonica with him. I don’t remember. But I played him the track. ‘It’s fantastic,’ he said. So it just happened very spontaneously. Which is a great thing to be able to do, especially nowadays because people, in general, don’t make records like that now. Everything has to be thought out and worked out and homogenized and well-produced. Whereas this was just very, very improvised.”

The video of
“Killing Floor”
which you can see below, shows
Slash
with his blues band composed of
Johnny Griparic
(Bass),
Teddy Andreadis
(keyboards),
Michael Jerome
(drums) and
Tash Neal
(vocals/guitar), while recording the song.

Of the song
Slash
he said: “‘Killing Floor’ is one of my favorite Howlin’ Wolf songs, but it’s also one of the blues riffs that got me hooked as a young guitarist. I’ve always wanted to sing it and this record was perfect. But playing it with this band and with Brian Johnson singing it was a result I never imagined. Not to mention Steven Tyler on harmonica.”

While
Brian Johnson
said: “When Slash asked me to sing on ‘Killing Floor,’ I said yes immediately. It was one of the first songs I learned in my first band and when he played me the track it was an obvious choice, and Steven’s harmonica is damn hot. I had a blast with Slash in the studio and I think we did this great old song justice. Rock on.”