AC/DC – Big Balls

It took me a while to like this band but this song helped. I remember this song in Jr High School and laughing until tears were flowing… I still get a laugh out of it. There is something about the Bon Scott era that I like the best. He had a sense of humor but he also was a really good songwriter and his voice was so different. This one plays on words with a sexual edge. It’s clearly a juvenile song but I mean it in the best way. The way Scott’s posh upper crest voice sings it…I don’t see how he held in his laughter. This masterpiece was written by Bon Scott, Malcolm, and Angus Young.

Sexual innuendo is nothing new in rock ‘n’ roll with songs like Chuck Berry’s My Ding-a-Ling (which reminds me of the spirit of this song) and Jerry Lee Lewis’s Great Balls of Fire. This song was on their Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap album that was only released in Europe and Australia in 1976. Atlantic Records didn’t like the vocals and production on the album so they originally rejected it but wound up releasing it in America five years later. The album was finally released in 1981 in America and Canada after Bon Scott’s death.

Beany and Cecil (Western Animation) - TV Tropes

The name of the album and title track was based on a reference to a cartoon called Beany and Cecil, which Angus watched as a kid. One of the characters in it, “Dishonest John”, carried a business card that read “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap. Holidays, Sundays, and Special Rates.”

AcDc - Big Balls 2
Dishonest John

The album has been certified six-times platinum in America for sales of over six million copies. It is the fifth-highest-selling AC/DC record behind Back in Black, Highway To Hell, Black Ice, and The Razor’s Edge. According to THIS site, it has sold 7,224,562 copies.

Radio stations would sometimes play Big Balls together with Rocker because it’s right after this on the album and the song starts up right away. The album peaked at #5 in Australia in 1976 and at #3 on the Billboard Album Charts, #1 in Canada, and #20 in New Zealand in 1981.

Malcolm Young: “It was Angus that came up with the song title – Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap. It was based on a cartoon character that had the phrase as his calling card [Dishonest John in the TV cartoon Beany And Cecil]. Then Bon stuck in the line ‘I’m dirty, mean, mighty unclean’ from an advert for mosquito spray that was running on Aussie TV at the time. Yes, we were always a very topical band. We looked at what was happening in the world [laughing].

“Big Balls was the other one from that record that sticks in the mind. It was just a bit of a joke, a bit of fun. We needed to fill up the album, someone came up with a rumba or a tango, and Bon started writing these hilarious words. Bon loved an innuendo and he was obsessed with his balls.”

Big Balls

I’m upper, upper class high society
God’s gift to ballroom notoriety
And I always fill my ballroom
The event is never small
All the social papers say I’ve got the biggest balls of all

I’ve got big balls
I’ve got big balls
And they’re such big balls
Dirty big balls
And he’s got big balls,
And she’s got big balls,
But we’ve got the biggest balls of them all!

And my balls are always bouncing
My ballroom always full
And everybody comes and comes again
If your name is on the guest list
No one can take you higher
Everybody says I’ve got great balls of fire!

I’ve got big balls
I’ve got big balls
And they’re such big balls
Dirty big balls
And he’s got big balls,
And she’s got big balls,
But we’ve got the biggest balls of them all!

Some balls are held for charity
And some for fancy dress
But when they’re held for pleasure,
They’re the balls that I like best.
And my balls are always bouncing,
To the left and to the right.
It’s my belief that my big balls should be held every night.

I’ve got big balls
I’ve got big balls
And they’re such big balls
Dirty big balls
And he’s got big balls,
And she’s got big balls,
But we’ve got the biggest balls of them all!

And I’m just itching to tell you about them
Oh, we have such wonderful fun
Seafood cocktail
Crabs
Crayfish

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball fan, old movie and tv show fan... and a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

40 thoughts on “AC/DC – Big Balls”

      1. Which one did You Shook Me All Night? Was that Scott too? Cuz I kind of like that one too. I guess Highway to Hell is all right too.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Brian Johnson did You Shook Me All Night…Scott did Highway to Hell…I like Brian Johnson also but tend to lean toward Scott.

        Liked by 1 person

  2. I remember watching Beanie and Cecil in old reruns and I think it was on the same show as Bullwinkle the Moose. I could never figure out what Cecil was though. Was he a dragon, an eel, a snake, a dinosaur? I couldn’t figure it out.

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    1. This is the first I’ve ever seen of them. I watched them on youtube while writing this. It does have that Bullwinkle feel about it.
      I thought Dinosaur but I’m not sure either.

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  3. Had a friend in college who used to see them in concert and played their stuff non-stop in the dorm. If I wasn’t an AC/DC fan before then, I was thereafter. This isn’t one of my favorite songs, but I enjoyed the backstory here. I remember Beany and Cecil well. I always rooted for Cecil…”I’m a-comin, Beany-boy!”

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  4. Cool background, never heard of ‘Beanie and Cecil’ nor had an idea that the album title was from a cartoon! he did use wordplay well on this one… sort of double entendre thing you could imagine ‘Are You Being Served’ making a whole bit on. Funny timing, I was going to mention to you today I heard AC-DC, ‘Back in Black’ being played in the local Walmart yesterday! One wonders what Angus and Brian J would think of that!

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    1. Think of how far we came since You Shook Me came out. That was one of the first songs I ever played live at our high school. Many teachers did not approve…that is when I knew we did the right bunch of songs lol.

      I would have never dreamed it would play as background in a store.

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  5. Awesome post Max! Love this tune esp at the end where they are chanting Ball Sucker Ball Sucker! 😂 like that pic as well that you posted of the band as I have never seen that shot before.
    Classic tune for a Tuesday Bro!

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  7. I too was a late-comer to the band. Love both the Bon Scott and Brian Johnson versions. This track is so different from everything else they do, but they carry it off magnificently. 🙂

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  12. AC/DC were an acquired taste for me as well, which I find hard to believe from today’s perspective, given how much I dig them now. That said, I can’t claim to know their albums in and out. From “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” I only knew the title track. Nice to learn about the backstory about the album’s title.

    “Big Balls” is kind of hilarious because of the lyrics. I’m not sure it’s going to become one of my favorite AC/DC tunes musically speaking when you have rock gems like “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘n’ Roll)”, Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap”, “Whole Lotta Rosie”, Sin City”, Highway to Hell”, “Hells Bells”, “Back in Black”…the list goes on and on.

    I guess AC/DC did have a thing for balls. There’s also “She’s Got Balls” and what I feel is a late-stage career highlight, “Play Ball”.

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    1. No this isn’t destined to be a favorite song but it is nice seeing that they had a sense of humor! Yea they went with Balls a lot.
      It is clever in a 7th grade kind of way lol.

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  16. I heard this for the first time in Jr. High School too. That seems to be the perfect age to discover this silly song. It’s catchy, funny, and mischievous. I had to turn the volume down when Mom passed my bedroom 🙂

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    1. LOL…oh yes! I remember getting…and you may be too young to remember Columbia House…but I would get records through them. I would get Richard Pryor and turn it down every time my mom would pass by.

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      1. I DO remember Columbia House! Miss those days. Everything is too accessible today. The charm in the find is missing. Richard Pryor was edgy stuff! So funny. I remember Eddie Murphy RAW was the taboo VHS tape to watch when parents weren’t around…

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      2. I would “sign up” people and get free albums…all was good until mom saw the bill for these people I made up with our address lol. She knew there was some treachery was afoot.

        Oh….Bernie have you read any movie reviews from Pam? All Things Thriller? She is one of the best writers on WP to me.

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