Media Review - By Dante Bonutto

The venerable Heep it was who'd opened the show, blending the (very) old and the new in a scramble of Mick Box features, but there was no doubt who LA had turned out to pose for...

Scaling the lighting/look-out towers at the front of the stage, determined to give each section of the crowd the chance for a solo stomp 'n' bellow, a few seconds of spotlight infamy, Joe Elliott is constantly on the move. Indeed, during the hour and three quarters set he gets the chance to catch his breath only twice - once during the instrumental workout 'Switch 625', where he adds six strings to his bow and lines up with his peers in best Southern Boogie/guitar army pose, and once during guitarist Phil Collen's (brief) solo. These moments aside, he's getting on with the task of providing a focus for the sympathetic skills of the afformentioned Collen and fellow 'picker' Steve 'Steamin' Clark, their pincer attack ably supported by Rick Savage (bass) and Rick Allen (drums), a time-keeping team of quartz crystal merit.

'Rock! Rock! (Till You Drop)', 'High 'N' Dry (Saturday Night)', 'Rock Of Ages', 'Photograph', 'Billy's Got A Gun', 'Bringin' On The Heartbreak', 'Mirror Mirror (Look Into My Eyes)', 'Wasted', etc....in the cauldron of concensus that is the LA Forum the flame-framed set takes on a classic ring, boding well for the bands three, carefully selected UK dates in December. But back to LA...

After a degree of coaxing from Collen and some wild variations on the 'get 'em off!' theme from the crowd, Elliott slowly removes his Union Jack T-shirt to reveal...no, not the usual wire-wool shrubbery, but (yeehah!) a previously hidden stars 'n' stripes singlet - a genuine tribute to the country that first squeezed a pedestal under Zeppelin and has now followed suit with the Lepps.

Indeed, it's got to the point now where Elliott can get himself screamed at simply by standing still ("There's certain places in the states where I could s**t onstage and they'd clap!") but that just isn't the Leppard way. This band have worked nights and overtime for their success though playing is something they clearly enjoy, old-fashioned grins of the ear-to-ear variety being much in evidence as, at the end of the second forum show, Brian May plus reconstituted mantlepiece steps up to jam on Creedence Clearwater Revival's 'Travelin' Band', Gary Moore and Jon Butcher - who both did stints on the Leppard tour - having done so in the past. Not surprisingly, neither Fernando Von Arb nor Mark Kohler from Krokus recieved a similar offer....

By Dante Bonutto @ Kerrang! 1983.

Show Story - From Animal Instinct

Def Leppard's hipness quotient shot up dramatically when Brian May came on stage at the end of one of the Forum shows to play Travellin' Band. "That was great for us," exults Joe. "We had all been Queen fans for ten years. I bought Sheer Heart Attack when it came out in 1974. So to have him on our stage was a real buzz."

Capping a great stand was the prescence in the audience of five sets of Leppard parents, specially imported from England for the evening to watch their sons in action. "When we saw their show in Sheffield last February, we thought they could do no more," Sav's mum told a reporter from the Sheffield Star that night. "But tonight they pulled something more out of the bag and the vast crowd really made it."
By Zomba Books 1987.