Like its three predecessors, AC/DC’s fourth studio album was initially released with a different tracklisting at home from internationally. In this case, the first vinyl editions were the same all over the world, but Atlantic Records changed their minds about the song “Crabsody In Blue” after the fact, removing it from later international LPs and replacing it with a slightly shortened version (edited from 5:46 to 5:24) of “Problem Child,” from Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap. The album also started out with different cover art — audiences outside Australia got to puzzle over the iconic performance shot, wondering whether this was a live album or what, while fans at home saw a stark black-and-white image of fingers on a guitar neck. Weirdly, those fingers didn’t belong to either of the Young brothers; they were Chris Turner’s, of Aussie proto-metal thugs Buffalo (who would release their final studio album, Average Rock ‘N’ Roller, that same year).

LTBR was pushed out with astonishing speed. Recorded in January and February 1977, it was in Australian stores on March 21. And while it comes loaded with four of AC/DC’s best songs of the Scott era, the other four tracks have little to recommend them but riffs — and, unbelievable as it may seem, sometimes a riff isn’t enough.

Interestingly, each side starts off weak and gets stronger as it goes along. “Let There Be Rock” is one of the ass-kickingest songs in the band’s catalog, totally living up to its title, but it doesn’t launch the album, as any sane person would expect. Nope, first you’ve got to sit through “Go Down” and “Dog Eat Dog.” The former is a decent blues-boogie jam about receiving oral sex; the second is a song about how much life sucks sometimes. Both these songs are objectively some of the best rock music ever made, just because they feature the rhythm section of Malcolm Young, Mark Evans and Phil Rudd, but they’re still kinda … ordinary, by AC/DC standards.

It’s not until track three that LTBR really gets cooking, but when it does, HOLY FUCKING SHIT. That riff, so dirty and loose it sounds like Malcolm’s strings are going to sag down to the floor. Rudd’s relentless, unstoppable, totally fill-less drumming. The pick slide that introduces Angus Young’s first solo, and the feedback that ends it (1:13-1:45). Bon Scott’s “hillbilly” voice on the phrase “and you could hear the fingers pickin'” (2:35). The pick slide that starts Angus’s second lead break/solo (3:00-3:35). The way Bon screams “let there be rock” to introduce Angus’s third solo (4:15-6:05). This is a song that will make your head explode with raw joy.

There are three other great songs on LTBR: “Bad Boy Boogie,” which comes right after the title track, “Hell Ain’t A Bad Place To Be,” and “Whole Lotta Rosie.” The first two are slightly slower, still slamming it to you good and hard but with a little more swing and a little less “what the hell did you cut this speed with?” But “Rosie” is one of those ’70s hard rock songs (you can also find a lot of them in the catalogs of Aerosmith, Ted Nugent, and George Thorogood) that seem to render punk rock totally unnecessary. A grinding blues riff laid atop a drumbeat designed to make you want to kick a stranger to death, it gives you two and a half minutes of based-on-a-true-story appreciation for a fat girl who likes to fuck (without ever seeming to sneer at or look down on her for it), followed by a three-minute guitar solo. It’s one of the greatest leave-‘em-wanting-more album closers in rock history.

Let There Be Rock is too unbalanced to be one of AC/DC’s best albums, but the four killer tracks make it essential listening.