Back in Black

The song was the band's tribute to Bon Scott. It was the album's second US single and reached number 37 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1981. When the band asked Brian Johnson for a lyric, they told him it could not be morbid and had to be a celebration of Bon. Johnson said he wrote whatever came into his head, including the lines about nine lives and cats eyes, and thought it was nonsense at the time. The band, he said, saw Bon's life in it.

Angus told Guitar World about the riff that Malcolm had been working on at three o'clock in the morning, saying it was driving him nuts. Angus, trying to sleep, told him it sounded fine. Michael Hann of The Guardian ranked the song number three on his list of the band's 40 greatest in 2020. He praised the descending spiral at the end of the first statement of the riff and the small hiccups at the end of the second, and the space that lets those details be heard.

In 1984 the Beastie Boys sampled it without permission for their song Rock Hard. When they asked for permission in 1999 for a compilation, the band refused, with Mike D quoting Malcolm as saying they did not endorse sampling. Shakira performed it on her 2002 and 2003 tour, and Living Colour and Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue have covered it. In 2017 Muse played it at the Reading Festival with Johnson on vocals. Of the 2,183 logged setlists that list songs, 1,359 include it.