Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia, welcomed Rock and Roll Hall of Famers AC/DC and their Power Up Tour to town on Thursday night, with The Pretty Reckless serving as the evening’s opening act. Out on the road in support of their latest studio album, Power Up, AC/DC brought nearly a decade of pent-up fan demand to the home venue for the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC.
Opened in 2017, Mercedes-Benz Stadium quickly established itself as one of the city’s premier destinations for major live concerts, combining its massive enclosed design with impressive sightlines, state-of-the-art sound and lighting, and an immersive atmosphere that puts tens of thousands of fans in the middle of the action. That energy was evident well before the music began, as dedicated AC/DC fans sporting legacy tour shirts and blinking red devil horns lined up outside the stadium long before doors were scheduled to open, providing an unmistakable indication of just how much the band’s return to Atlanta meant to its loyal following.
Taking the stage just after 7:00 p.m., The Pretty Reckless faced the unenviable task of warming up a stadium crowd that had come primarily to witness one of rock’s most enduring heavyweights. Charismatic Taylor Momsen and company wasted little time establishing their own identity, launching into “Death by Rock and Roll” before moving through a tightly constructed 10-song set that balanced the band’s darker hard-rock attack with its more melodic side. “Since You’re Gone” and “Follow Me Down” kept the momentum high, while newer material such as “For I Am Death” and “When I Wake Up,” from their latest release, Dear God (June 2026), demonstrated that The Pretty Reckless were not simply leaning on their established catalog.
Momsen proved particularly well suited to the scale of the stadium, delivering her vocals with a combination of grit, control and theatrical presence that carried beyond the stage and into the upper reaches of the massive venue. Guitarist Ben Phillips, bassist Mark Damon and drummer Jamie Perkins provided a muscular foundation, allowing Momsen to deliver the full-throttle punch of a track like “Make Me Wanna Die” without sacrificing the songs’ dynamics. As an opening performance, the set was necessarily abbreviated, but The Pretty Reckless treated the limited stage time as an opportunity rather than a constraint, closing with “Going to Hell” and “About You” and leaving the crowd primed for the main event. Their inclusion on this tour clearly underscored the band’s ability to command a stadium setting while remaining unmistakably their own force within the evening’s heavier rock lineup.
The Pretty Reckless
Taylor Momsen — Lead vocals, rhythm guitar
Ben Phillips — Lead guitar, backing vocals
Mark Damon — Bass
Jamie Perkins — Drums
Setlist:
1.) Death by Rock and Roll
2.) Since You’re Gone
3.) Follow Me Down
4.) Only Love Can Save Me Now
5.) For I Am Death
6.) When I Wake Up
7.) Make Me Wanna Die
8.) Heaven Knows
9.) Going to Hell
10.) About You
By the time AC/DC finally took the stage at 8:30 p.m., Mercedes-Benz Stadium had become a sea of black T-shirts, raised fists and generations of fans united by the same unmistakable guitar riffs. The band wasted no time proving that its formula remains remarkably effective, opening with the straight-ahead hard rock of “If You Want Blood (You’ve Got It),” the kind of song that has defined AC/DC for more than five decades. Guitarist Angus Young remained the kinetic center of the performance, attacking his guitar with the same wiry intensity that has made him one of rock’s most recognizable figures, while 78-year-old Brian Johnson’s weathered but still formidable voice gave the songs their familiar grit. “Back in Black,” “Demon Fire,” “Shot Down in Flames” and “Thunderstruck” transformed the stadium into an enormous singalong, with each riff receiving a thunderous response from a crowd that had waited nearly a decade to see the band return to Atlanta.
As the set progressed, AC/DC leaned increasingly into the catalog that has made the band a permanent fixture in rock culture. “Hells Bells” provided one of the evening’s signature visual moments, while “Highway to Hell,” “Shoot to Thrill,” “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” and “You Shook Me All Night Long” kept the stadium at full volume. Stevie Young supplied the rhythmic backbone alongside his 71-year-old uncle Angus, with Chris Chaney and Matt Laug filling out the touring lineup and giving the classic material the weight and precision required to translate across a football stadium. Rather than attempting to reinvent songs that have already survived decades of changing musical fashions, AC/DC played them with conviction and let their cumulative power do the work. That approach was particularly effective in a venue of Mercedes-Benz Stadium’s scale, where the band’s stripped-down musical architecture allowed the guitars, drums and Johnson’s unmistakable vocals to remain the focus in front of a wall of Marshall amplifiers. The result was less a nostalgia exercise than a reminder that these songs were engineered for a shared live performance experience in the first place.
AC/DC saved some of its biggest ammunition for the closing stretch, with “Whole Lotta Rosie,” “Let There Be Rock” and Angus Young’s extended, 20-minute guitar solo spotlight driving the performance toward its inevitable climax before “T.N.T.” and “For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)” delivered the final two-song encore barrage. The closing cannons were more than a familiar concert gimmick; they served as the exclamation point on a performance constructed around the enduring physicality of rock and roll. After spending much of the evening surrounded by songs that have become part of the collective vocabulary of the genre, the Atlanta audience was left with the unmistakable feeling that AC/DC had delivered exactly what it came to see: no unnecessary detours, no attempt to soften the edges and no shortage of volume. For a band approaching its sixth decade, AC/DC’s ability to turn a modern stadium into a communal rock club remains its greatest achievement — and on the Power Up Tour, that formula still hits with considerable force.
AC/DC’s Power Up Tour rumbles on for another month, wrapping up on Tuesday, September 29, at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
AC/DC
Angus Young — Lead guitar, occasional backing vocals
Brian Johnson — Lead vocals
Stevie Young — Rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Matt Laug — Drums (touring)
Chris Chaney — Bass, backing vocals (touring)
Setlist:
1.) If You Want Blood (You’ve Got It)
2.) Back in Black
3.) Demon Fire
4.) Shot Down in Flames
5.) Thunderstruck
6.) Have a Drink on Me
7.) Hells Bells
8.) Shot in the Dark
9.) Stuff Upper Lip
10.) Highway to Hell
11.) Shoot to Thrill
12.) Sin City
13.) Jailbreak
14.) Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
15.) High Voltage
16.) Riff Raff
17.) You Shook Me All Night Long
18.) Whole Lotta Rosie
19.) Let There Be Rock
Encore
20.) T.N.T.
21.) For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)
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Elliott is a music photographer covering shows in Atlanta, Georgia, and the surrounding area. The highlight of his photography career was back in the early ’90s, when he sold Neil Diamond the rights to his negatives from a show and then purchased a set of tires for his 1979 280ZX during college with the money.