Tuesday, 20th May 2014
Def Leppard 1980
Def Leppard played their first ever US show in Santa Monica, CA 34 years ago today on 20th May 1980.
The band played its first ever show in the USA at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium opening for Pat Travers. It was the first of 9 shows supporting Pat and his band who were touring for the 'Crash And Burn' album.
They had played a UK tour in March 1980 with Girl as openers featuring Phil Collen and Simon Laffy.
Coincidentally there are now 34 days to go until the latest US show in Salt Lake City, UT.
Shown below are various band member quotes about this show.
1987 - Animal Instinct Biography Quotes
"I was shitting myself," Rick Allen admits. "I had a brand new drum kit, never seen it before, and it was all out of tune. It had been specially ordered and arrived the day of the show."
Travers' drummer Tommy Aldridge, one of Rick's idols, helped him set it up right and tune it in time for Leppard's curtain call.
"Within two songs, there were kids shouting for Wasted," Joe marvels. "Only four or five of them, of course. But there were 2500 other people there that had never heard of us and they accepted us as well. Nobody booed. There was always a reaction and it was ninety-nine percent positive."
The band opened with "Hello America". "Surprise, Surprise," laughs Sav. "But we could not believe the reaction. Sure we'd come from England where we were very popular and you couldn't pick up a music paper without reading something about us. But this was America, where we thought nobody would know anything about us, And these people not only knew the songs, they were going mad for them. We thought 'Hey, this is it, this is fantastic.' It was better than England, and we were known in England."
1999 - Joe Elliott Quote
"Yeah it was, it was the 20th of May at the Santa Monica Civic - I remember when we first went out on stage we were opening up for Pat Travers in the Civic and the lights went down and we went on and there was this polite applause. But I remember one person about seven or eight rows back screaming out "Wasted!", which was one of the songs off the first album. I remember turning round to somebody and going "Holy shit! they've heard of us, you know cause I didn't expect that they had."
2000 - Joe Elliott Quote
"When we opened up for Pat Travers - the first gig we did was in Santa Monica, CA - the lights went down, we walked out onstage, and I heard somebody shout, "Wasted!" I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe that somebody in America actually had heard one of our records."
- Def Leppard - Santa Monica 1980 Show Page
- Def Leppard - On Through The Night Tour 1980
- Def Leppard - 2014 Tour News
- Previous News - 9th May 2014