Birmingham, AL - Fan Reviews

Fan Review - By Deborah

Hello everyone.. Not sure what to say about the concert, actually..besides.. As always, the guys put on an AWESOME show. This was a music festival, of course. Its name was City Stages. An annual event every summer here in B'ham. Over 100 artist attend, and play their hearts out to the city of Birmingham, for the period of 3 days. Just so happens, this year the Guys attended. And by far the best festival B'ham has put on yet.

The group that was on before DL, was called Montrose , they totally rocked. Reminded me of the younger Leppards. I was really impressed. There whole perforance was DL all over again, in the beginning stages. I had to take pictures. Full of energy, the whole ' i'm a rock star' imagine. The leader singer, himself, damn was a replica of Joe back in the days. The shoulder length curly dark hair, the tight leather pants, struttin across the stage, jumping around, etc. Anyways, he repeated over and over again, how much he appreciated DL inviting them along to this event. Talked about what a great band and group of guys they were.

Anyways, now about Def Leppard... Joe mentioned what a wonderful crowd they had. Put his hand over his eyes, (like Sav does).. looking as far back as he could. Mind you, B'ham blocked off, several streets for these concerts. Our stage was the 'Miller Lite' Stage. And, Joe made the comment, on poeple were stretched out as far as he could see. Then said it was 'freakin unbelievable'..LOL It was cool, I must say. Definitely a treat. He acted so excited about the whole thing. Which the crowd loved, his excitement as well. He said, he would definitely come back to the 'City Stages'. "Damn, talk about a block party" (were the words from the group 'Montrose') fuckin awesome" (the lead guitarist spoke). It was amazing you guys. Absolutely, freakin amazing!! The best show I've seen, in along time.

Anyways, people were crowded in the streets for blocks, people standing going nuts on the rooftops of the downtown B'ham buildings. They were absolutely eveywhere. It was such a rush, I'm telling ya. I was standing up front, with a couple people (4, maybe 5) people between me and the gate, seperating the stage and the crowd.

The streets were jumping/bouncing as the band played. Totally wired, standing on a street attending a DL concent. LOL.. was awesome, once again. I have tons of pictures, that I will get developed today. And, I will definitely share them as soon as I get them back. Not alot more to say, I'm still shell shocked, I think. I just cant tell ya, how great it was. One more thing I will add. I meet up with a fellow DL fan, Jacquline, from one of our yahoo groups. She has NEVER attended a DL concert before. Bless her, LOL...Anyways, not one moment, did I see her NOT singing, NOT screaming, Not dancing, or Not having her hands in the air!! I'm still smiling and chuckling about her excitement. After show was done, I asked her how she liked it? She smiled wide, and said, she'll never forget it, for the rest of her life. She also said, it was the best show she had ever seen, in all her days. You Rock, Jackie!! And, DL totally ROCKED!!! Cheers, peeps.

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Fan Review - By Tracy

The show in Birmingham was excellent to say the least. Me and my sisters drove in from atlanta and arrived at the venue around 3:30. By the time we got there, quite a few people were already in position for where they wanted to be during the show. Luckily I got where I wanted which was right in front of phil.The bands before the leps ranged from really bad to pretty entertaining. I especially liked "Peppers Ghost" and "Montrose".

On to the important part. First, the weather was actually pretty nice, not too hot which is unusual for an outdoor show in the south. The stage, I thought was pretty small and the area narrow. I could not even tell you how many people were at the show, however the mass of people went all the way back to the gates.

Def Leppard finally came on about 10:20 and the crowd went nuts. "Action" was a great song to open with as it really set the tone for the rest of the show which was a pretty rockin' set. A few songs really stood out for me. "Gods of War"- incredible. I was happy to hear them playing that instead of " Have you ever needed someone so bad", which I like, but I like the more rockin', make you sweat, jumping up and down songs rather than the ballads.

"Rock On" was also totally awesome. Joe was on the stage alone, standing on the drum riser singing the song. I thought his voice sounded fantastic and he really looked great. "Rocket" of course was outstanding and I never get tired of hearing them play this. The dueling guitars just sound so kick ass and it is a lot of fun watching Phil and Viv tease each other. I noticed during the show that Phil changed guitars at least four times, maybe five. He even played on his glow in the dark dracula which is a really cool guitar so check it out if you go to any of the shows.The guys played till around 12:00 ending with "Sugar" which made all the screaming fans scream even louder (including this screaming fan whose voice still sounds like a frog) and the pushing even more intense.

Joe ended the show with his standard " Don't forget us, we won! 't forget you", and I have a feeling the people in birmingham won't forget that show for a long time.

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Fan Review - By Dana

I flew all the way from Los Angeles to Birmingham for this show. Really to meet my very dear friend for the first time. She and I met on Def Leppard's forum over a year ago and she drove in from Tennessee. And what a perfect show to see :-) The guys played for nearly two hours, which was completely unexpected by the audience!

I arrived at one of the gates about 1/2 hour before the festival opened. On Friday night I decided that I wanted to stand front center, and that's exactly where I was! From this gate we could see the Miller Lite stage about two city blocks ahead of us but I couldn't tell who was on it (just lots of people). Suddenly I heard the opening riff of Action, and I shouted "They're up there!" Then I heard "Vivian mike" then "Sav mike" then "center mike" and finally "Joe vocal." And then it came, the intro to Gods Of War and they actually soundchecked about 1/2 of the song. I sang along right in line and started dancing too! I asked people in line with me if any of them were also here to see Def Leppard and some said "Yes!" I met lots more people once they started gathering during the afternoon.

Montrose was one of my favorite college bands, so it was like a trip down memory lane for me hearing all those great songs :-) Their singer is awesome! And as your first fan reviewer said, he reminded lots of people of young Joe. He brought so much energy to the lead vocal! Finally when Def Leppard took the stage, we were all sooo ready for them. It had been a very long day in the sun, and lots of great bands, and all worth it. There was alot of press taking photos and filming, and the guys sounded and looked wonderful! Every song was again perfect, and Rock On was an awesome song.. it starts very true to the original classic song, then it EXPLODES with hard rock and intense lights. We loved it! Again, the crowd was nothing short of joyful when they played No Matter What and Promises, Gods Of War was a treat especially since I've never heard it live and it's one of my favorites. Phil and Vivian dueled guitars during Rocket, and the whole show was absolutely superb! Everyone sang along, and we all had so much fun.

My warmest thanks and a big hug would go out to all of the guys for making my 2nd Leppard concert experience one that I will never forget.

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Fan Review - By Dana Miller

June 18 my husbands birthday, but he was sweet enough to drive me down to Columbia Tennessee to meet another Lep fan and go to the concert. We got to Birmingham around 1 and a few people were already there including Dana from California who we met up with. We got our spot up front and the only time I moved was for a quick break and I got my program. Some of the groups that played were ok but the others I thought would never end.

Then it was Def Leppards turn and it went by way to quick!!! I had a blast and I thought they sounded great. They played all my favorites but then again as my Aunt used to say"which Def Leppard songs aren't your favorites??" "Love Bites"," Animal" and "Let it Go", I just have to hear live. I enjoyed "Gods of War", "No Matter what" was great. They had a huge screen behind Rick but I didn't really pay to much attention to it until "Rock on" started I thought it was cool how they had their faces morphing into each other at the beginning. Well the last song was "Pour Some Sugar on Me" and everyone got loud the look on one of the security guards face was priceless.

I wrote on the back of a fan "Phil can I have a pic?" and he read it then checked his pockets he went back to his mic stand and got 1 threw it, it didn't make it and neither did his 2nd attempt. I got a cute i'm sorry look from him but i'm happy he tried to give me one that meant something to me. Well not only did I have a great time I met some nice people at this show and hopefully i'll see some of them in Memphis on July 26th for another great show.

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