“Spent a lovely morning at the Porsche Track Experience at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham AL. Thanks to the whole team for having me, had a wonderful day. Cheers!” – Vivian Campbell

A night before Def Leppard played Fenway Park in Boston, frontman Joe Elliott got to get a feel for the stage when Billy Joel invited him out for a duet.

Towards the end of his set, Joel introduced Elliott, who received a thunderous greeting from the stadium audience. The two singers and Joel’s band immediately launched into the opening bars of Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me.”

You can see video of the surprise collaboration above.

Elliott later returned to sing “You May Be Right” with Joel at the end of the encore. Via iheartradio

JOE ELLOTT’S SONGS FROM THE VAULT ON SIRIUS XM’S DEEP VINYL

Tune into Joe’s new monthly radio show on Sirius to hear artists like THE DOORS, STEELY DAN, SWEET, SUPERTRAMP and more!

In the ’80s, when Journey and Def Leppard hit peak popularity, the idea of the two touring together would have seemed silly. Back then “Don’t Stop Believin’ ” and “Photograph” appealed to different demographics; people argued they had diametrically opposed attitudes and aesthetics. Today it’s those differences that seem silly.

And so Journey and Def Leppard have set out together on a monster trek of American stadiums — including a packed stop at Fenway Park Saturday.

Selling nostalgia like $10 Bud Lights and peeling off hits you know by heart (only one song from the modern millennium, Def Leppard’s “Man Enough,” could be heard in over three hours of music), the pair reveled in their status as rock gods with pop souls.

Journey, which headlined the night (the bands swap that position every show), found its beloved balance between Van Halen’s bombast and Air Supply’s earnest melodies.

With the band’s longtime members deep into their 60s, current frontman Arnel Pineda provided the focal point. Guitarist Neal Schon once called Pineda a mix of David Lee Roth and Bruce Lee, and he’s not wrong. The guy can spin and kick and leap with the best of them. But his voice, which amazingly matches Steve Perry’s every cry and coo and chant of na na na na na na, shocked Journey’s icon catalog to life from “Separate Ways” to “Lovin’, Touchin’ Squeezin’ ” to “Open Arms.”

The other guys matter (after all they co-wrote the catalog). Schon can wail but he wants wail in every song and sometimes the shredding hip-checked a killer melody to the ground. Keyboardist Jonathan Cain plays his role with flair but his look and overly earnest attitude scream, “What can I do to get you into this Gulf Coast timeshare today!” Hometown drummer Steve Smith outshined them both and might be the only guy who could fill in for Neil Peart or Stewart Copeland.

But this set was Pineda’s, not something one usually says about a singer a band discovered on YouTube 35 years into their career.

Def Leppard, which should headline every night, crafts songs any artist could turn into Top 40 magic. Pulling from its set list, “Hysteria” could have been huge for Roxette or Heart, “When Love and Hate Collide” could be a gold record in the hands of Kenny Chesney or Bryan Adams. But their guitar harmonies define them.

The intertwining guitar lines written by the late Steve Clark and Phil Collen, now played by Collen and Vivian Campbell, are ultimate ear worms. No matter the setting — the pristine “Animal” or dirty “Foolin’, ” the intro to “Bringing on the Heartbreak” or surprising bridge of “Love Bites” — those doubled and complementary riffs powered the songs for an army of fans in the stands wearing Def Leppard shirts.

But no one on the bill did the whole pop band masquerading as a rock band thing with the cheek and panache of opener Cheap Trick. As usual, Cheap Trick proved there’s a sonic sweet spot between “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Toys in the Attic.” As usual, they played in afternoon to a half-full stadium.

Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott: ‘We had this inner demon of pop wanting to come out’

Read the full story on The Guardian HERE

Joe Elliott of Def Leppard has the look not so much of a rock star, but a character actor playing a rock star. The clothes are expensive, the hair carefully coloured, but the 58-year-old’s face – slightly downturned – could be that of a Yorkshire butcher fretting about his Barnsley chop supplier. His physique, reassuringly, is not that of a man who spends eight hours a day in the gym (“I’m not going to go out there wearing a union jack shirt and leather trousers and do a split-jump,” he says). He is also delightfully fannish still – we discover a mutual love of the Italian band Giuda, and sing their hit Roll the Balls to each other.

Def Leppard may have passed into the heritage rock business these days, but that business is big. They are on a massive tour of US arenas, then they will perform Hysteria, the 1987 album that became hard rock’s Thriller, in full across Australasia and the UK. Oh, and a box set of all their 80s recordings has been released. That’s a whole lot of Leppard to go round this year, and Elliott is in the mood to talk about it.

“We always had this inner demon of pop wanting to come out,” he says of the single that turned Def Leppard from an up-and-coming metal band into stars of MTV and the biggest rock band of their era. “[Bassist] Rick Savage loved bands like Queen and T Rex; I loved T Rex and Bowie and Sweet and Slade. We were always aiming to do something like that, but we could never really pull it together until Photograph.

I remember the first time I heard the riff through the studio wall: me and a couple of the crew went” – Elliott pulls an amazed face – “and when that happens collectively, you know somebody’s hit on something.”Photograph’s parent album, Pyromania, went diamond in the US – platinum sales 15 times over – but to achieve that level of success meant putting the band before everything else, even friendship. Partway through the recording, they had to sack guitarist Pete Willis, who had founded the band, because of his drinking. “It was holding us back,” Elliott says. “We all drank, don’t get me wrong, but when we drank we just told dirtier jokes a little louder. Pete caused problems. He was disruptive and negative. The band had to come first.”

Read the full story on The Guardian HERE

Did you know Joe Elliott has his own show on Planet Rock Radio every week? You can expect to hear mighty fine rock along with some of the most influential tracks around. Each month we’ll publish a recap of Joe’s playlists, so you can listen along to some of his favorite tracks!

FOLLOW JOE’S PLANET ROCK PLAYLIST HERE

Tune in to hear JOE ELLIOTT on SATURDAYS at 6pm (GMT) / 1pm (EST) – repeated every Tuesday from 9pm (GMT) / 4pm (EST).

For those in the U.K. tune into Joe’s weekly radio show on PlanetRock.com.

For those listening outside the U.K. or in the U.S. listen live from this site HERE. Please note this Surf.com internet site may not work in some countries. As a quick fix, please download a VPN application and set it to the UK territory. Then download the Planet Rock app and boom, it works.

Celebrating 31 years of Hysteria today – don’t miss the “Hysteria + More Tour” coming to Europe, Japan, Australia & New Zealand this winter! Get tickets here: https://www.defleppard.com/tour/