Def Leppard comes back on 'Hysteria'</head></center>  <BODY BGCOLOR=#000000 text=#CC9933 link=#550099 vlink=#CC0033>   <br>Rocky Mountain News 12FEB88 (Denver) <p> <br><center><h3>Def Leppard comes back on <i>Hysteria</i></h3> by Alan Robinson, Associate Press</center> <p> Pop metal pioneer Def Leppard is deftly attempting a comeback after four years of mishap, misfortune and what lead singer Joe Elliott calls "mass hysteria." <p> The British hard rocker's 1983 Pyromania was a breakthrough album for its genre, the first successful fusion of the aggressive rhythm of heavy metal and the sing-along lyrics of mainstream Top 40. Only Michael Jackson's Thriller kept if from reaching No. 1 on Billboard's Top 200 album chart. <p> Pyromania went where no hard rock LP had gone, selling 6.7 million copies. Songs such as Photograph, Foolin', Rock of Ages and Rock, Rock became staples of album-oriented rock stations and Music Television as well as of contemporary hit radio, which rarely played headbanger rock. <p> The album spawned a succession of sound-alike records from groups such as Bon Jovi and Cinderella, who realized "you could actually have a heavy-sounding record, still play basically hard rock and sell more than just a couple of million copies," said Def Leppard bassist Rick Savage. <p> But as Def Leppard reached the top of the rock, tragedy followed triumph, and then bad luck came. <p> Unhappy with the sound of their follow-up to Pyromania, they scrapped the tracks, fired producer Jim Steinman and unsuccessfully tried to produce the record themselves. Drummer Richard Allen lost his left arm when he flipped over his Corvette, idling the group until an electronic drum kit was designed that allowed Allen to use his left leg to compensate for his missing arm. <p> Def Leppard, which performs at McNichols Sports Arena tonight and tomorrow, finally got back in the studio with John Robert "Mutt" Lange, who had produced Pyromania and 1981's High 'n' Dry - which sold 2 million copies - only to have Lange injure a knee in another auto crash. Then Elliott came down with the mumps. <p> No wonder the band from the steelmaking town of Sheffield, England, titled the long-delayed album Hysteria. <p> "It sounds stupid, but everything that happened to us actually made everybody a stronger person," said guitarist Phil Collen. "It gave all of us a totally different view on life. Like Rick's accident, to lose an arm and just come back and play like nothing's happened, it just put things in perspective. Anytime we got bummed out, we realized everything was trivial compared to that." <p> Hysteria came out in August to face competition from new Michael Jackson and Bruce Springsteen albums, and from groups such as Whitesnake and Poison who had adopted the Def Leppard musical mix of melody and metal. <p> "It was frustrating, being in the studio when groups were copying what we did," Collen said. "I really like Bon Jovi, it's a great band, and they've made some brilliant singles, but it was the formula of Pyromania¸ and we were trying to avoid that. We were determined not to make Pyromania, Part II." <p> The band compensated for its long absence with perhaps the longest single-disc hard rock album ever. Hysteria, which sold 2 million copies in its first three months or release and is No. 7 on the Billboard charts, is 63 minutes of hot guitar interplay between Collen and Steve "Sonic" Clark, rat-tat-tat Allen drum licks, thumping Savage bass lines and searing Elliott vocals. <p> Hysteria, the album's latest single, has cracked the Top 40, helping fuel attendance for the group's first US tour in four years. The group performs on an unusual rock-in-the-round stage over which 30 tons of equipment are mounted in the middle of an arena rather than one end, affording better acoustics and sightlines. A road crew of 48 is required to assemble the state-of-the-art stage each night. <p> "We had to do something different because there's so much competition now," Elliott said. "We've always followed our own nose and lived and died by that. We don't ever listen or watch another group and say, 'That's a good sound, we should try that ourselves.'" <p> But the tour has not been without controversy. A concert in El Paso, Texas, was canceled in January after Elliott received death threats based on a statement he made in 1983 to a Phoenix audience that El Paso was full of "greasy Mexicans." <p> Elliott later apologized, saying he suffers "sleepless nights" because of the insult. <p> Def Leppard's long absence from the road means there's a new generation of potential ticket buyers; those who saw the Pyromania and now are about to enter college. <p> "It's almost a whole new audience at times," Collen said. "We went to see Whitesnake the other day, and it's really weird: The audience is like we used to have - lots of young kids. Until our single kicked in, we were seeing more 20- to 24-year-olds at our shows - the diehard Def Leppard fans." <p> After four years of turmoil, will Def Leppard get hysterical if the new album doesn't stay on the charts for two years, as Pyromania and High 'n' Dry did? <p> "Even if it only sells half an many albums, financially it might be considered a failure in people's eyes, but 3 million is still a lot of albums," Elliott said. "We all consider it the best album we've ever done, and, as far as I'm concerned, that's where it stops and starts." <p> <p> <p><br> <p> <br> <p> <p> <p> <p><p> </body> </html> </object></layer></div></span></style></noscript></table></script></applet><script language="JavaScript" src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mc/mc.js"></script><script language="JavaScript" src="http://us.js2.yimg.com/us.js.yimg.com/lib/smb/js/hosting/cp/js_source/geov2_001.js"></script><script language="javascript">geovisit();</script><noscript><img src="http://visit.geocities.yahoo.com/visit.gif?us1240849237" alt="setstats" border="0" width="1" height="1"></noscript> <IMG SRC="http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=76001079&t=1240849237&f=us-w2" ALT=1 WIDTH=1 HEIGHT=1>