Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

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.

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.”

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

This song is about as sleazy as you can get but I like it.

AC/DC lead guitarist Angus Young got the song title from the 1962 animated cartoon series Beany and Cecil. The Show first aired on ABC Television and only ran for one season until the 26 episodes shown were cast as repeats for the next five years until it was recreated in 1968.

The specific inspiration for the song name was the cartoon’s main villain, “Dishonest John,” who would carry around a business card that said, “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap. Holidays, Sundays, and Special Rates.”

Norman and Marilyn White, a couple from Libertyville, Illinois, sued the band for invasion of privacy after they were inundated with calls due to this song. Apparently, many AC/DC fans in the area dialed 3-6-2-4-3-6-8 (thinking the “hey!” as “eight”), which was their phone number. The couple claimed they received hundreds of “lewd, suggestive and threatening” phone calls, asking for various dirty deeds at low, low prices. The Whites asked for $250,000 in damages and demanded that the band re-record the song, but a judge ruled against them. The people with the bad luck to have 867-5309 had the same problem but they only had inquiries about Jenny.

The song was written by Bon Scott, Angus, and Malcolm Young. The album was released in Australia and in Europe in 1976. The album was released in America in 1981 after Scott’s death and after the popular Back in Black. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Hits and #47 in the UK.

Lesley Gore, known for ’60s hits like “It’s My Party,” recorded this for the 2002 compilation album When Pigs Fly: Songs You Never Thought You’d Hear. Her version was produced by Mauro DeSantis, who worked with Cevin Soling on the track… I couldn’t find it on Youtube but click on that link. Lesley Gore channels her inner Bon Scott on this one…I didn’t like the music part as much but her singing was spot on.

From Songfacts

This song epitomizes AC/DC’s dangerous and mean sound, with Angus Young’s heavy guitar and Bon Scott’s leering, vocals that would have scared the living daylights out of any unsuspecting teenage Pop fans when this song first hit the airwaves (they did it on a national TV show in Australia called Countdown, which was usually frequented by acts like ABBA and Bucks Fizz).

This was recorded at Alberts Studios in Sydney, Australia in 1976 soon after the sessions that produced the Australian version of their TNT album.

Regarding the lyrics, “Just ring: 3-6-2-4-3-6,” this was an actual phone number in Australia at the time, and it also could describe the measurements of a very shapely woman: 36-24-36. A year later, the Commodores used the same measurements to describe a woman in their song “Brick House.” Sir Mix-a-Lot, however, scoffed at these measurements in his 1992 hit “Baby Got Back,” where he says: “36-24-36? Only if she’s 5’3.”

The ending is one of the most famous screams in rock history. For those wondering, it’s spelled: “Yaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrggghhhhhh!”

This was used in the Norm MacDonald movie Dirty Work. It is played while Norm’s character Mitch and his friend Sam are wrecking a building in an attempt to get it condemned.

On a 2008 episode of The Simpsons where they team up on a stakeout, we learn that Homer Simpson and the pious Ned Flanders have some common ground in their musical tastes. Homer likes AC/DC, and Ned likes their Christian tribute band: AD/BC, and their version of this song, “Kindly Deeds Done For Free.”

The song about murder for hire enjoyed a sales spike following drummer Phil Rudd being charged with trying to procure a murder in November 2014. The charge was soon dropped.

Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap

If you’re havin’ trouble with the high school head
He’s givin’ you the blues
You want to graduate but not in ‘is bed
Here’s what you gotta do
Pick up the phone
I’m always home
Call me any time
Just ring
36 24 36 hey
I lead a life of crime

Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap

You got problems in your life of love
You got a broken heart
He’s double dealin’ with your best friend
That’s when the teardrops start, fella
Pick up the phone
I’m here alone
Or make a social call
Come right in
Forget about him
We’ll have ourselves a ball

Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap

If you got a lady and you want her gone
But you ain’t got the guts
She keeps naggin’ at you night and day
Enough to drive ya nuts
Pick up the phone
Leave her alone
It’s time you made a stand
For a fee
I’m happy to be
Your back door man

Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap yeah
Dirty deeds and they’re done dirt cheap

Concrete shoes, cyanide, TNT
Done dirt cheap
Neckties, contracts, high voltage
Done dirt cheap

Dirty deeds
Do anything you wanna do
Done dirty cheap
Dirty deeds
Dirty deeds
Dirty deeds
Done dirt cheap

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AC/DC – Big Balls

AC/DC – Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap