Vivian Campbell - Tumblr Posts
Def Leppard with the same color palette as that previous Tesla photo.
VIVIAN CAMPBELL and RICK SAVAGE in MAKE LOVE LIKE A MAN live on TOP OF THE POPS
Def Leppard + Metallica
Walk with me
One for the Joe Hoes methinks!
Full text under the cut
"WE'RE THE LEAST OFFENSIVE BAND AROUND!"
Reckons all-round nice guy JOE ELLIOTT, but that doesn't stop the hugely successful DEF LEPPARD getting a slagging from the likes of Black Crowe Chris Robinson. Is it jealousy cos the Leps were the first band ever to sell seven million albums back- to-back, or do even the band themselves think they've wrung and sung themselves dry with their latest multi-million seller, 'Adrenalize', and the mammoth tour that's accompanied it? ALISON JOY stowed away aboard the band's mini-bus (no limos here!) to try to discover the way the land lies...
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1992 will not be remembered as one of the greatest days in the lives of Def Leppard- especially vocalist Joe Elliott. Still not completely recovered from the bout of pleurisy which caused him so much trouble a couple of months ago (and still knocking back eight tablets a day to keep it under control), Joe has also been struck down with every singer's nightmare - the sore throat.
Despite half-hearted attempts not to talk too much (difficult for one so vocal) and several visits to a flight case stocked full of everything from plasters to paracetamol, tonight's show in Champaign, Illinois is a bit of a duffer. The rest of the band play a blinder, but Elliott's below-par performance results in the set being cut short to try and save his voice.
Post-show, Joe pours himself about a quarter of a pint of whisky and states an intention to get "bolloxed drunk" and forget all about it. The problem is, with Leppard's inflexible touring schedule, there's just no recovery time when you're below par.
As Joe explains, "When we do two gigs in a row, I have no problem. When we do three, it's a lot harder. I'm not singing Billy Idol vocal lines that are dead easy - I'm singing demanding stuff, and it takes a lot of breath. When your throat gets screwed up it swells, which means less air gets in, which means you have to use your lungs more; it's very tiring."
Add to this the many hours Joe spends doing interviews, local radio, warming up and travelling, and it's easy to see why he can't just tuck himself up in bed with a Lemsip and sleep it off. It pisses him off that the audience pay part of the price for his illness, in paying to see a sub-standard Def Leppard performance. Fortunately, the crowd at Champaign's Assembly Hall are sympathetic, and respond by singing even louder to help him through.
ACTUALLY CANCELLING a show, however, is out of tha question.
"We've never cancelled a gig on the day," explains Elliott, "it's always been 48 hours notice. We've only ever cancelled two gigs because of me: Nottingham in '83, and on the last tour I dislocated a rib in Belfast and spent two nights in hospital. I had to have an epidural after the Nottingham show, it was so bad, and I had this big Velcro waistband holding my ribs in place. I did the next six or seven shows like that, and had to go to the doctor every day for injections."
Apart from that, there've only been a couple of other health disasters meriting cancellations; one when drummer Rick Allen had tendonitis in his arm, and another when guitarist Phil Collen was suffering from glandular fever. At that second show, two people returned their tickets and 500 turned up to try and buy spares.
As Joe explains, "You've got 58 people on the road for 18 months. It's a physical impossibility for nothing to go wrong. When it's the singer who's ill, though, it's just so much more highlighted." Suddenly laughing, he adds, "Mind you, it'll probably do us a bit of good to sound out of tune now and again, cos everybody thinks we've got everything on tape! At least Champaign proved we do f**k up!"
LEAVING THE ASSEMBLY Hall, the band and entourage surprise the fans waiting outside by getting not into a fleet of limos, but squashing into a small mini-bus. Def Leppard do not fart around in limousines, instead preferring the friendly banter of the small bus, and tonight talk is of the show, Joe's voice and, natch, football.
I'm perched at the back next to guitarist Viv Campbell, who offstage wears his hair in a very interesting ponytail which sits right on the top of his head. It is, he reckons, "convenient". Viv's planning to move back to Ireland soon, after a few years' exile in Los Angeles, meaning he'll be much nearer to Joe's home studio.
Up front, Joe turns round, points at Viv and laughs, "He's worked with Lou Gramm, David Coverdale and Ronnie Dio and now he's lumbered with me!" Self- deprecation? They got it!
When the mini-bus pulls up at Champaign Airport, Def Leppard's plane is waiting in the snow. The small plane - certainly more functional than glamorous - is what enables the band to play every corner of America in a very short space of time. The flight is a short hop to Green Bay, Wisconsin, where the temperature is hovering at around minus 10. Although the next day is a day off, the band turn straight into bed for some well-earned rest most likely in preparation for the five-a-side football match that's been arranged!
DESPITE THE fact that Def Leppard are successful, down-to-earth blokes, some people just can't resist putting the knife in, and as Joe Elliott himself admits, "I don't know one person in the music business, apart from Brian May, who actually likes us". Indeed, The Black Crowes' Chris Robinson made a completely unprovoked attack on the Leps in Kerrang! recently: how does that kind of thing make Joe feel?
"Well," he ponders, "I've got to look at it from two points of view. There's a part of me that says it's unprofessional, but this is the most unprofessional business in the world anyway. Everybody knows that controversy sells. We've slagged bands off in the past, when we were about the same age as Chris is, so I can't really have a go at him for it.
"If Chris Robinson doesn't like Def Leppard, fine; I still like The Black Crowes, and I'm not gonna not like them just because he doesn't like us. They're retrospective, trying to go back and be The Rolling Stones, while we've been criticised for trying to push things into the future. As much as I like them, though, if I was in that kind of mood, I'd put 'Exile On Main Street' on instead, because it's much better. "The only people who like us are kids that come to concerts and buy records, and that suits me fine. I'd much rather do a show in front of 16,000 screaming kids with no musicians ligging than be one of those bands who everybody in the business likes. I remember when everybody was sucking up Lenny Kravitz' arse so much it was like they all wanted to give him an enema! Yet the guy couldn't fill the Marquee! I'd much rather have it the other way round."
STAYING WITH all things critical, what would be your response to people who label you as sexist because of songs like 'Make Love Like A Man' and 'Personal Property'?
Joe sighs a long, hard sigh, then finally says, "The way I look at it is that you're portraying a role on every song you sing. Phil Collen wrote 'Miss You In A Heartbeat', and when I sing it, it might be a song he wrote about his wife, but I don't sing it to his wife, I sing it on his behalf to his wife, and to anybody else that wants to hear it.
"When I do 'Let's Get Rocked', I'm pretending to be Bart Simpson, but when I did it I was 32 years old. Warren Mitchell is not Alf Garnett; Alf Garnett is a sexist, Warren Mitchell is an actor playing a sexist. When we do those songs, we're just portraying a vibe. 'Personal Property' is not sexist, I don't see how anybody could think it is. All it's doing is putting a woman on a pedestal, and you just end up with these typical skinhead, dungaree-wearing women saying, 'Sexist crap'. Get a life! It's just four minutes of rock 'n' roll - and we're the least offensive band around!
"We would never sing 'Back Off Bitch', but did anybody have a go at Axl? No, because they're too busy trying to figure out his personality. With us, I guess there's nothing else to look at..."
THE FOLLOWING day's show at Brown County Arena, Green Bay presents a different band to the one who limped home in Champaign, and their relief is evident. Everything runs according to plan and the crowd are, to quote that song, hysterical.
Fan hysteria is something Def Leppard have had to deal with for a few years now, and there are plenty of tales to tell about band members arriving at hotels to find naked women in their beds, or people who barge into their rooms and refuse to leave. Just what, to Joe Elliott, is the price of fame?
"No throat most days!" he laughs, before continuing, "No, I can live with 98 per cent of it, because this is what I want. The most painful thing about this whole situation is that all your friends become phone friends, I don't get to see United (Sheffield, that is), and because this is an expensive tour and we have to do five shows a week, I occasionally suffer from throat problems.
"We have never had bodyguards, because the way that you project yourself is the way you are responded to. We've always tried to project ourselves as a bunch of normal guys who can prove that you can sell 15 million albums and not have to vomit on a preacher man, beat people up, piss in aeroplane seats, rape women... whatever you've got to do to prove your 'macho-ness' and get publicity.
"The reason Guns N' Roses are so big is that they've got good songs and a bad boy image. What small amount of bad boy image we had died with Steve, and he'd be the first to admit that he didn't sell one record with his image as a bad boy.
"As for the privacy thing, well, I could walk through a shopping mall tomorrow and maybe six people would stop me. So I sign six autographs - big deal! If somebody's following me, though, I get pissed off. I don't like upsetting fans, but some people are so fanatical you can tell them to f**k off and they'll still buy your next LP!"
AND DEF Leppard have sold more than a few. With every album from 'High And Dry' onwards selling on a multi-million scale, sceptics might wonder just how much longer the band can keep up their astonishing success. So how many more albums will Def Leppard make, and can they keep producing those multi-million sellers?
Joe: "Well, if we've got 10 more years in our career, that means two albums! No, I don't know. This one's ('Adrenalize') not gonna sell as many as 'Hysteria', though, I can tell you that now. That one was a phenomenon; it happens once in a lifetime.
"I'd be happy if we sold three million every time. Sales don't bother me much; I'm financially secure, so I'm not motivated by money - I'm motivated by being a better singer than I was on the last album. The challenge on the next record is to see how Viv's songwriting fits in with ours."
So you're not planning a sudden retirement?
"No - though I would hate to see happening to us what happened to bands like Uriah Heep or individuals like Billy Squier, who just disappeared off the face of the earth, because I think we're better than that. I'm not too happy about the fact that we put an album out every four but if somebody said, 'Would you go back and change the way things have gone?', then other than Steve dying, no, I wouldn't. We were the first band ever to do seven million albums back-to-back (with 'Pyromania' and 'Hysteria') and if this one does it, we'll be the first to do three."
AND WITH 'Adrenalize' getting close to six million sales right now, Leppard look poised to break another record and once more rubbish the cynics who say they should pack it in.
An' for Leo fans in Britain, this year still holds a bit of promise. January 18 saw the release of 'Heaven is' as a single, and word has it that the band will also headline an outdoor gig at Don Valley Stadium, Sheffield in September. The latter has yet to be confirmed, but you can guarantee that if Def Leppard are the hosts it's sure to be one hell of a party...
sav sluts of course
where are you sitting?
Some of you asked to make a compilation, you ask, you receive! Probably a part one if more are found!
Have you ever noticed how they change their own lyrics live? If so, let me know! These are some of the ones I caught while watching some of their live performances including “Let’s Get Rocked” and “Slang”. These make their performances a lot more fun and unique!
Adrenalize World Tour — Last final show was in Mexico City in 1993
Adrenalize Era circa 1992-1993
DEF LEPPARD - ANOTHER HIT AND RUN in LIVE IN SHEFFIELD (1993) x
adrenalize/retroactive era
i have so much to share later but just a little summary of my night: the concert was amazing and i had so much fun!! the guys looked and sounded incredible, definitely one of my favorite shows i’ve ever been to :) ALSO LOOK AT HOW CLOSE I WAS AHHH i’m still on cloud nine
Happy Birthday Mr. Campbell!!🎂🎂I hope it's awesome and fun, hopefully the guys don't pick on you too much!!😉😉🥳🥳🥂🥂
*sigh* alright ladies and gents, boys and girls, doggies and kitties…
today is a very special day.
today we’re celebrating the birth of probably one of the biggest sweethearts i’ve (still) yet to have the pleasure of meeting BUT MY BEST FRIEND HAS!!!
that’s right, i’m talking about VIVIAN CAMPBELL!!!
i have more pics, hang on.
Def Leppard at Sofi Stadium 08/25/24
Happy Birthday Viv!
One of THE best nights of my life.
Hope you guys enjoy these pics I took from the concert! Definitely sung my heart out that night. It was my first Def Leppard concert, and let me tell you, they did NOT disappoint at all. Can’t wait to see them again.
More photos I took from the SoFi Stadium concert (08/25/24).