Music: Def Leppard, Yeah or Nay and Categorization

[Gordon Lightfoot]

I liked them when I was probably 10-12 years old. I remember thinking that Pyromania was pretty cool, especially Foolin' cause I liked the video and thought it was a way better song than Photograph, which I also liked. Rock of Ages was enjoyable as well.


I know I had Hysteria, too. It was a big deal, and I remember being impressed by the fact that a person could drum with one arm. Also thought the singles were pretty good, though even as a 12 year old I thought Pour Some Sugar on Me was a bit too much... like it was made for girls or something. The first three songs on Hysteria (probably all singles) were good but I don't remember a thing about the rest, outside of Sugar.
'
Not a band I have much interest in revisiting, though I have a sudden urge to listen to Foolin', so I do appreciate this thread.

 

[Baby Punisher]

Was the first band I fell in love with. I can listen to a bit from Hysteria and Adrenalize. But nothing beats the first 3 albums though. High N Dry is my favorite album from them but On Through the Night is severely underrated.

Unfortunately I think they lost a lot of their magic when Steve Clark died. He was a primary songwriter on all but like 3 or 4 songs on the first 4 albums.

Yep, he wrote all those riffs and jangles that made so many of those songs hits. They did become a better live band with Vivian Campbell. He is a good player and a good singer. Steve Clark couldn't sing to save his life. Joe said he would mouth the words during live sets

 

[BackToTheBrierePatch]

Def Leppard and Tesla over any of the shit music that has come out over the last 10 years.
Yes, my age is showing

 

[reckoning]

I liked them when I was 14. I liked junk food a lot back then too. I still have my vinyl copies of High n' Dry and Pyromania, and while I never listen to them anymore, I might turn up the volume if a song from those comes on the radio.

By 1987, my musical tastes had shifted towards alternative/college rock; but I still picked Hysteria when it was released. What a disappointment. Except for the title track, I thought the album was complete garbage, and my opinion hasn't changed since then.

 

[Double-Shift Lasse]

Like many have already said, early Def Leppard is masterful riff-based hard rock. I’ve barely heard anything they’ve done since Hysteria.

 

[Roo Returns]

Pour some sugar on me is the white people national anthem.

Don't Start Believing or Hypnotize by Biggie at past 11:30 PM at any bar.

 

[Roo Returns]

The early Def Leppard is almost forgotten. A big part of the NWOBHM along with Maiden/Priest/etc.
Great music that holds up today and even a black metal band like Midnight (from Cleveland, Ohio) actually quotes some of those riffs.

They went commercial by the mid-80s. They had some hits after.

I liked their song from The Last Action Hero soundtrack. By that point I was a pre-teen into stuff like RHCP/Metallica/Nirvana/Helmet but this and Hooligan's Holiday by Crue I viewed as squeezing the last juice out of the 80s commercial metal era.

 

[K Fleur]

Don't Start Believing or Hypnotize by Biggie at past 11:30 PM at any bar.

Pony by Ginuwine is up there. Living on a prayer by Bon Jovi also.

 

[Roo Returns]

Pony by Ginuwine is up there. Living on a prayer by Bon Jovi also.

Yup!

 

[S E P H]

I like Def Leppard, there music is very basic and is made to be catchy for that rock star stereotype persona. However, I much prefer them over other bands at the time like AC/DC and Guns 'n' Roses. The one song I dislike by them is "Pour Sugar on Me" and that's because it's overplayed and they have better songs like "Rocket".

 

[BackToTheBrierePatch]

I like Def Leppard, there music is very basic and is made to be catchy for that rock star stereotype persona. However, I much prefer them over other bands at the time like AC/DC and Guns 'n' Roses. The one song I dislike by them is "Pour Sugar on Me" and that's because it's overplayed and they have better songs like "Rocket".

Love Bites is bad. I love the band, but that song? NO

 

[Milos Krasic]

What has 9 arms and sucks?

 

[sigma six]

What has 9 arms and sucks?

I liked them quite a bit in middle school (mid 80's) but the staying power that other bands had wasn't there...probably because they were already past their peak.

 

[BackToTheBrierePatch]

What has 9 arms and sucks?

what is brainless and makes needless noise?
Todays music scene.

 

[Baby Punisher]

Like many have already said, early Def Leppard is masterful riff-based hard rock. I’ve barely heard anything they’ve done since Hysteria.

Adrenalize in many ways is Hysteria 2. Not as good, but not a bad album at all. Phil Collen recorded all the guitar parts and tried to play them the way Steve would have. You can tell. A lot the music was written by Clark and you can tell the way it's being played that it's not Clark playing.

Retroactive is really good. It's mostly originals, that didn't make the final cuts for Hysteria and Adrenalize. Clark is credited with writing and recorded most of the tracks.

Slang is a tricky album. The first time I heard it in July, 1996 I hated it. I barely got through it. I was like these guys are done and forgot about them for years. Many fans felt that way. Now years later Slang is considered the best album of the post-Hysteria era. It was so ahead of its time that people couldn't wrap their heads around it.

Euphoria is decent. Nothing earth-shattering. Typical Def Leppard sound. You can hear them trying to do something different while trying to connect to their older fans while trying to find new fans. IMO they are trying to hard. There are 2 tracks I really love and 2 more that I like a lot.

X I have never listened to this album. I have heard a couple of songs and the ones I heard I liked.

Songs from the Sparkle Lounge is not good at all.

Def Leppard is really good. The band admitted that they just wanted to get back to the things that worked for them in the early days and the result is an album that feels like the best of the early years of the band.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Interesting note: Mutt Lange developed his recording techniques massively on Hysteria; that was a huge part of why it took so long to record (Rick Allen's accident aside). The guitar parts took six times longer because he recorded every string on its own track. So Collen and Clark had to play each guitar line all the way through six times on one string only. All the phrasing, all the chords, everything. One of the first times Lange tried doing that was on Run to You by Bryan Adams. That part coming out of the quiet bridge but just before they go back to the chorus one more time? That was the beta test for how Hysteria's guitars were recorded.



Don't know about the albums after Hysteria, didn't really follow the band after that. When Adrenalize came out I was waist-deep in grunge, thrash and industrial.

 

[Hasbro]

Show of hands?

 

[Baby Punisher]

Interesting note: Mutt Lange developed his recording techniques massively on Hysteria; that was a huge part of why it took so long to record (Rick Allen's accident aside). The guitar parts took six times longer because he recorded every string on its own track. So Collen and Clark had to play each guitar line all the way through six times on one string only. All the phrasing, all the chords, everything. One of the first times Lange tried doing that was on Run to You by Bryan Adams. That part coming out of the quiet bridge but just before they go back to the chorus one more time? That was the beta test for how Hysteria's guitars were recorded.



Don't know about the albums after Hysteria, didn't really follow the band after that. When Adrenalize came out I was waist-deep in grunge, thrash and industrial.

Lange was using some new and untested equipment at the time and creating his own techniques at the same time. People forget that Lange didn't get involved until about a year after the band started recording with Steinman. Mutt was burnt out. Allen had his car accident, Mutt had his own severe car accident during that time frame as well. It was a lot of work. A lot of lost time. Grunge and alternative was pretty big by the time aderlanize was released.

 

[forsbergavs32]

Adrenalize in many ways is Hysteria 2. Not as good, but not a bad album at all. Phil Collen recorded all the guitar parts and tried to play them the way Steve would have. You can tell. A lot the music was written by Clark and you can tell the way it's being played that it's not Clark playing.

Retroactive is really good. It's mostly originals, that didn't make the final cuts for Hysteria and Adrenalize. Clark is credited with writing and recorded most of the tracks.

Slang is a tricky album. The first time I heard it in July, 1996 I hated it. I barely got through it. I was like these guys are done and forgot about them for years. Many fans felt that way. Now years later Slang is considered the best album of the post-Hysteria era. It was so ahead of its time that people couldn't wrap their heads around it.

Euphoria is decent. Nothing earth-shattering. Typical Def Leppard sound. You can hear them trying to do something different while trying to connect to their older fans while trying to find new fans. IMO they are trying to hard. There are 2 tracks I really love and 2 more that I like a lot.

X I have never listened to this album. I have heard a couple of songs and the ones I heard I liked.

Songs from the Sparkle Lounge is not good at all.

Def Leppard is really good. The band admitted that they just wanted to get back to the things that worked for them in the early days and the result is an album that feels like the best of the early years of the band.

I keep hearing that the self-titled album is great but I’ve listened to a handful of songs from it and just can’t get into it. I haven’t liked anything since Euphoria (and I only liked 2 songs).

What songs from the self-titled album do you recommend I try again as a fan of the first 5 albums, but mostly listen to the first 3 now.

 

[kihei]

Liked a couple of their early tunes, but they faded from my memory quickly. In all honesty, this response is the first thought I have had about them in probably 30 years.

 

[Smelling Salt]

Their pre-90s run of albums is probably the GOAT in their genre no doubt. I even like Adrenalize, but I get the hate for it. It's really overdone but has a few gems on it.

Then you go and listen to Bryan Adams - Waking Up the Neighbours and you realize hey I've heard this album before...when it was called Adrenalize. WUTN came out first but the recording sessions overlapped. Some of the songs sound basically the same and the production very similar aside from the DL guitars being a little more layered and lush. But it's all there. The drum sound, the harmonies, the layered background vocals etc.

 

[Baby Punisher]

I keep hearing that the self-titled album is great but I’ve listened to a handful of songs from it and just can’t get into it. I haven’t liked anything since Euphoria (and I only liked 2 songs).

What songs from the self-titled album do you recommend I try again as a fan of the first 5 albums, but mostly listen to the first 3 now.

Wings of an Angel
Forever Young
Let's go
Broke and Broken hearted
Man enough

 

[Baby Punisher]

Their pre-90s run of albums is probably the GOAT in their genre no doubt. I even like Adrenalize, but I get the hate for it. It's really overdone but has a few gems on it.

Then you go and listen to Bryan Adams - Waking Up the Neighbours and you realize hey I've heard this album before...when it was called Adrenalize. WUTN came out first but the recording sessions overlapped. Some of the songs sound basically the same and the production very similar aside from the DL guitars being a little more layered and lush. But it's all there. The drum sound, the harmonies, the layered background vocals etc.

There is a track on that album, "don't drop that bomb on me" that sounds like it came straight off of Hysteria that BA is covering.

 

[Smelling Salt]

Wings of an Angel
Forever Young
Let's go
Broke and Broken hearted
Man enough

Dangerous is an absolute banger but it's basically Photograph v2.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Their pre-90s run of albums is probably the GOAT in their genre no doubt. I even like Adrenalize, but I get the hate for it. It's really overdone but has a few gems on it.

Then you go and listen to Bryan Adams - Waking Up the Neighbours and you realize hey I've heard this album before...when it was called Adrenalize. WUTN came out first but the recording sessions overlapped. Some of the songs sound basically the same and the production very similar aside from the DL guitars being a little more layered and lush. But it's all there. The drum sound, the harmonies, the layered background vocals etc.

Yeah, that's Mutt Lange. Both artists being vastly overproduced by the same guy.