Bon v Brian: The science
A Canadian boffin has put one of life’s more interesting questions to the test. Who is better? Bon or Brian. The results can be found in the paper On the Efficiency of AC/DC: Bon Scott versus Brian Johnson.
In this paper, we explore this issue. Since it is difficult to ascertain which vocalist was better given the heterogeneity of musical tastes, our analysis does not focus on the aural or sonic quality of the vocalists’ performances. Rather, using tools from the field of experimental economics, and we consider which vocalist results in individual arriving at more efficient outcomes in a simple bargaining game. Our results suggest that having participants listen to songs by AC/DC in which Brian Johnson served as vocalist results in participants realizing more efficient outcomes. Thus, in terms of a singer’s ability to implement efficient behavioral outcomes among listeners, our results suggest that Brian Johnson was a better vocalist than Bon Scott.
There are obvious problems with the experiment’s design. Using Canadian dollars for a start is just perplexing. Also, only two songs were used (A Long Way to the Top and Shoot to Thrill). The sample size is too small and needs to be extended across multiple albums. . How about Bon singing Let There Be Rock versus Brian doing For Those About To Rock?
Even with those caveats in mind, I do hope this is the start of a boon in the long overdue scientific examination of AC/DC. One day we may get an answer to the question, which I am often asked by people in the street, AC/DC: A transformative hermeneutics for the dialectic paradign of narrative or just good beer drinkin’ music?
August 24, 2007 at 3:44 am
The biggest question this raises, and which to date has never been answered, is: WTF do economists think they are on about?
Back to the very flawed study.
first off.
It’s been carried out on canuck Uni students in 2007. We can assume this means 18 to 22 years olds born in Canada in the years 1985 - 1989. Avoiding the question “wtf would they know about music” as the study did just imagine what these poor buggers had to listen to in utero from their parents vinyl collection, Bachman Turner Over Drive and Heart and what they had to listen to on the Canadian radio, Bachman Turner Over Drive and Heart . Not quite child abuse but hardly a benign input to a yet to be formed neural pathway.
Secondly:
an australian study, even if based on a similarly deprived cohort, would have a naturally much higher ranking for BOTH Bon AND Long Way TTT.
The study is not replicable here and therfore should not have been published.
Thirdly.
Even on its own miserable terms the study is flawed. The “researchers” should have held the song constant. The band and song could be held constant with only the vocalist changing. Then we might be able to look a the results.
Fourthly.
Other than an obscure blogger from an Australian backwater, a Mr S Cronin, who on earth, creates public policy while listening to ACCADACCA. [saying Pauline Hanson will not impress the examiner]
Fifthly
In further design flaws I wish to point out that no acdc listener would play a wuzzy game involving offering $10 to a person. Get real. At least make it realistic. Say $50 in return for a bottle of Bundy, a baggie or a couple of cones and a few rohys to recover tomorrow.