Buddha/Lounge - Renditions of AC/DC

Mystical, Far Eastern versions of classic AC/DC songs including, Hell's Bells, Back In Black, Highway To Hell, Thunderstruck and more! Is what the cover of Buddha/Lounge - Renditions of AC/DC claims.

Let me start with it's club style drum samples mixed with a Cakewalk sounding collection of eastern instruments, namely a sitar. That means it only sounds Eastern and is in fact not Eastern. In the event I'm wrong and the instrumentation is actual live people, I do appologize.

Now once you get past there being no vocals at all, the music sounding like something you'd hear in you corner Eastern store, the fact starts to sink in that this is some mellow AC/DC knock off that is best enjoyed with some really good weed. This is not an AC/DC album for friends.

The entire track list is as follows: Hell's Bells, Back In Black, Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, Rock & Roll Ain't Noise Pollution, Have A Drink On Me, Highway To Hell, What Do You Do For Money, Honey, You Shook Me All Night Long, Sin City, Thunderstruck, T.N.T. and Who Made Who. A great collection of classic songs from one of the greatest Blues based Rock bands.

Each song sounds like the original, more or less. Like I mentioned before the drums have been changed. A sitar pretty much takes over the guitar lines, but no solos, a little bass-like keyboarding, and then extra sound effects and percussion intruments added for texture.

I picked up the album from a $4.99 rack, may have been as high as $8.99. I didn't have high hopes for it, but was dissapointed when it wasn't real instrumentation. I would love to hear these songs actually done by an Eastern band, which is what I thought I was getting.

Instead I end up with something that sounds like it was put together by Eiffel 65, and should be played in a rave somewhere in India, or in a shitty Bollywood version of The Matrix. Bollywood movies are in fact quite interesting, so when I say "shitty" I mean a B film.

The one positive thing I will say about this album, is that it does really bring down my blood pressure. I'm not sure if it's because of my laughing at the joke of an album, or the fact that it's soothingly mellow. Perhaps it's a bit of both.

4/10 - content

5/10 - production

3/10 - personal bias