AC/DC fans get ready
Published Thursday April 23rd, 2009
Speculation begins on bands who will open for rockers at Aug. 6 concert
BY ALAN COCHRANE
TIMES & TRANSCRIPT STAFF
Tickets have only been on sale for a few days and the concert is still 105 days away, but fans of AC/DC are getting ready to beat a path to Metro Moncton.
Irish band The Answer is odds on favourite to open for the Moncton AC/DC concert in August.
"I've had calls from Afghanistan, from Canadian soldiers who will be home in time for the concert. They're getting their wives to buy tickets and they're booking space in the campground," local businessman Troy Boudreau said yesterday.
Immediately after the announcement of the AC/DC concert was official, Boudreau revamped his website and started taking calls from people looking for camping space next to the concert site. Last year, the concert campsite became a home-away-from-home for hundreds of Eagles fans and it looks like the AC/DC fans are already hunting for a place to stay since many local hotels are already booked for Aug. 6.
"We've had calls from people all over the place: from Maine, Ontario, Quebec and Vancouver so far," Boudreau said yesterday.
Tickets for the Aug. 6 show went on sale last Friday and sales have been brisk. The limited number of grandstand seats sold out in 12 minutes. Promoters said more than 40,000 tickets were sold on the first day but said they would not provide daily ticket sales figures after the first day.
The Rolling Stones show in 2005 drew a crowd of about 80,000 people and tickets were still being sold at the gate on the morning of the outdoor concert. The City of Moncton says the outdoor concert site can handle a crowd of about 100,000.
Promoters have not yet officially announced who will be the opening acts for AC/DC, but it is expected that Irish Group The Answer will be called in for the gig.
"We are expecting to do that tour, just waiting on final confirmation," a source inside The Answer's management office said in an e-mail from Ireland yesterday.
The Answer is an up-and-coming four-piece rock unit from County Down in Northern Ireland with a bluesy vintage rock sound a la Led Zeppelin, the Black Crowes and The Who. They recently released an album called Everyday Demons. They already served as opening act on the fall leg of the AC/DC tour.
It is expected that AC/DC will likely do a two-hour set of approximately 20 songs, beginning around 8:30 p.m. In previous concerts at the Magnetic Hill concert site, the gates have opened around noon with the first bands beginning around 3 p.m.
At last year's concert on the hill, the Sam Roberts Band began at 3:30 p.m., followed by Scottish singer KT Tunstall at 5:30 p.m., and John Fogerty at 7 p.m. The Eagles began their set just after 8:30 p.m. and played until 11 p.m.
AC/DC has been a fan favourite in Metro Moncton and the initial announcement of their concert had been the subject of speculation for many weeks. And now that tickets are selling briskly, there is much speculation around town as to what bands will fill the opening time slots. Some of the band names being thrown around include Nickelback, Steve Miller, the Foo Fighters and Motorhead. All three of these bands appear to be free on Aug. 6.
Don Coleman, an AC/DC fan from Hillsborough, has started an online movement to have Canadian group MOXY serve as opening act in Moncton.
He says MOXY is the only Canadian band who headlined a tour -- in Texas in the 1970s -- with AC/DC as the opening act and suggests that turnabout is fair play.
Formed in Toronto in the 1970s, MOXY was known for the 1975 hit song Can't You See I'm a Star