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Arena masters
Def Leppard wants to 'keep raising the bar'
Def Leppard is (from left) Rick Savage, Phil Collen, Joe Elliott, Rick Allen and Vivian Campbell. The band will perform with Cheap Trick and Poison on Saturday at the BOK Center. Andrew MacPherson/Courtesy
By JENNIFER CHANCELLOR World Scene Writer
Published: 8/16/2009 2:25 AM
Last Modified: 8/16/2009 5:04 AM
The phrase "road warriors" doesn't even begin to describe these three headliners.
Cheap Trick, Poison and Def Leppard have forged long careers by dogging highways and filling stadiums and arenas. For all three acts, their live shows have defined their sound for generations of fans.
"This is our fifth year straight on the road," said Def Leppard lead guitarist Phil Collen during a recent phone interview from North Carolina. "We've just kept adding to the whole show.
"We just keep raising the bar."
Def Leppard frontman Joe Elliott told Rolling Stone magazine in June, "We've got 90 minutes to try and keep every Leppard fan out there happy, because they'll all get, 'Oh, they should've played this, and they should've played that,' " he said. "What we've done is, we've got a tour set that's going to change. We've got certain songs we're going to flip out every night, but I doubt very much we'll play the same set two nights in a row."
He added that some songs are "required" playing at all shows, though. For example, "Pour Some Sugar on Me," "Rock of Ages," "Love Bites" make it into nearly every set, "or we wouldn't get out of the building alive," Elliott added.
Unlike bands such as Aerosmith, which claims to have sold more video games with its music on them than it has studio albums in the past few years, "I'd spend more money going to a cinema than we've made on video games," Collen said with a laugh. "I definitely see the value. The record industry has crumbled; it's losing about 8 percent of its market every year.
"Things are very different now than when we first started out," he said. "It was always single, then album, then tour. Now it's the other way around," he said, remarking that album sales help support the tour. Especially in the 1980s, tours used to spur gargantuan record sales.
In fact, the band's early record sales are nearly unheard of by today's "blockbuster bands." Def Leppard's early chart buster, 1987's "Hysteria," sold more than 20 million albums worldwide. It stayed on the American Billboard charts for nearly three years.
In the United States alone, the '83 album "Pyromania" sold more than 10 million albums. (Overall, the band has sold close to 70 million worldwide.) During that time, the video for the single "Photograph" got more requests on MTV than even Michael Jackson's "Beat It." It topped the Billboard rock charts for six weeks and made the Billboard pop chart at No. 12.
In recent years, Def Leppard has broken more rules, which has only grown their fan base. They crossed over into country superstardom in 2008, when — at country music starlet Taylor Swift's request — the band joined her in Nashville for a collaborative show for Country Music Television's "Crossroads" series.
"She's a huge, huge fan of ours," said Collen. Swift took front-and-center on vocal duets with lead singer Elliott on songs including "Photograph" and "Pour Some Sugar on Me," among others.
The kings of arena rock paired with another country music superstar — Tim McGraw — for the single "Nine Lives," which was used for on ABC and ESPN networks.
"We use a lot more ways to get our music out there than ever before," said Collen. "We just keep growing."
Def Leppard, Cheap Trick and Poison
When: Doors open 5:30
p.m., show 7 p.m. Saturday
Where: BOK Center, 200 S.
Denver Ave.
Tickets: $125, $85, $65, $45
plus fees, available via BOK
Center box office, tulsaworld.com/Bok, area Reasor’s
locations or by calling (866)
7-BOK-CTR.
Online: tulsaworld.com/Defleppard, tulsaworld.com/poison, tulsaworld.com/CheapTrick
Cheap Trick
Formed: 1974 in Rockford, Ill.
Genres: Powerpop, melodic
pop, pop-punk
Years active: 1974 through present
Current members: Robin Zander,
Bun E. Carlos, Rick Nielson,
Tom Petersson
The album you need to hear
before this show: The live album
that exploded their U.S. career,
1979’s “Cheap Trick at Budokan.”
It includes the tunes “I Want You
to Want Me,” “Come On, Come
On,” “Surrender” “Big Eyes” and
more.
Greatest hits: “Dream Police,”
“Don’t Be Cruel,” “The Flame,”
“Surrender,” “I Want You to
Want Me,” “She’s Tight,” “Mandocello,”
“That ’70s Song”
Poison
Formed: 1983 in Mechanicsburg,
Pa.
Genres: Hard rock, glam metal
Years active: 1983 through
present
Current members: Bret
Michaels, C.C. DeVille, Rikki
Rockett, Bobby Dall
The album you need to hear
before this show: The band’s 1986
debut album, “Look What the
Cat Dragged In.” It included the
singles “Cry Tough,” “Talk Dirty
to Me,” “I Want Action” and “I
Won’t Forget You.”
Greatest hits: “Unskinny Bop,”
“Nothin’ but a Good Time,”
“Every Rose Has its Thorn,” “Talk
Dirty to Me,” “Your Mama Don’t
Dance,” “Something to Believe
In”
Jennifer Chancellor 581-8346
jennifer.chancellor@tulsaworld.com
By JENNIFER CHANCELLOR World Scene Writer
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