Thursday, 8th December 2016
Def Leppard 1982
Def Leppard filmed their classic Rock Of Ages promo video 34 years ago on this day in 1982 in London, England.
The video was filmed at the iconic Battersea Power Station building in central London.
The building had been decommissioned as a power station since the mid 70s. Earlier this year it was bought by Apple to be their new London headquarters.
The same building where the band filmed the Photograph video on 2nd December.
Pink Floyd featured the building on their iconic 'Animals' album cover in 1977.
The shoot date on 8th December 1982 was also Phil Collen's 26th birthday and the second of two Lep videos to be shot on band members birthdays.
Like 'Photograph' video was another big hit on US MTV in mid 1983.
The video saw the band performing on a sound stage with a different backdrop to the first video. Extra scenes included a woman chained to a tree, an Owl, clapping hands below the band in a sea of dry ice, Joe walking around with a sword and lots of fire.
The band and then co-manager Peter Mensch also dressed up as monks. Peter is seen at the start of the video miming to the song intro. Joe is also shown wearing a T-Shirt featuring the line 'It's Better To Burn Out, Than Fade Away'.
Read the band's commentary on this video below from the 2005 'Rock Of Ages The DVD Collection'.
Rock Of Ages Video Shoot Photo - (Click for full size)
Rock Of Ages - 2005 DVD Commentary
Vivian Campbell - "Hey who are these guys?."
Rick Allen - "One of them is Peter Mensch."
Phil Collen - "That's Peter Mensch. Although that's not him really saying that. That's Mutt Lange saying that."
Joe Elliott - "An Owl!."
Rick Savage - "Why is that owl there?."
Joe Elliott - "Because Alright sounds like Owl!. This video's got every cliche. Watch my bandana. All the way through this video it keeps going from the knot to the V, to the knot to the V."
Rick Allen - "Is that your bottom?."
Joe Elliott - "Nice ass Phil."
Phil Collen - "That's my ass as they said in Rolling Stone. Who could forget Phil Collen's spandex clad ass."
Rick Allen - "They're not spandex."
Phil Collen - "Oh I know but that's what they said."
Vivian Campbell - "A minor detail."
Phil Collen - "Still clad and ass."
Vivian Campbell - "And still shaking. More importantly."
Phil Collen - "Absolutely. So this is kind of early videos. You know we're kind of doing what they're telling us to do which is David Mallet again which was all good fun."
Vivian Campbell - "You stand over there and do this."
Phil Collen - "Yeah you do that. We're gonna put a chick in here. But it was all new you know. It was all MTV."
Rick Allen - "Where'd that come from?. We're gonna put a chicken here?. Oh a chick!."
Phil Collen - "Shut up. A girl. A video chick."
Rick Savage - "What big ears you have."
Rick Allen - "These are great fun to make though."
Phil Collen - "Really good fun yeah."
Joe Elliott - "This was shot on your birthday. No this was shot on Phil's birthday."
Rick Savage - "On Phil's birthday, yeah."
Joe Elliott - "Photograph was shot on your birthday."
Rick Savage - "That's right yeah."
Joe Elliott - "This was December '82."
Rick Savage - "December '82 yeah. A week apart."
Joe Elliott - "So this had been in the can for about six months before it went to MTV anyway."
Rick Savage - "Oh absolutely yeah."
Joe Elliott - "Now that's serious forward planning folks."
Rick Allen - "It's funny when we're making these videos. When we first started making videos I was like really shy and I wouldn't look at the camera or anything. And then Joe said like you know play to the camera a little bit. And then he created a monster. And then he had to tell me and say Rick, maybe you shouldn't look at the camera as much as you normally do."
Rock Of Ages Video 1982 - Photo Gallery
Vivian Campbell - "Look at the size of Joe's sword."
Joe Elliott - "Oh god."
Phil Collen - "I didn't know we were that kind of a band. Look."
Vivian Campbell - "Yeah Ronnie Dio would be proud of this."
Phil Collen - "Absolutely. Look gauntlets. Flames! Wow."
Vivian Campbell - "Monks in hoods."
Rick Allen - "We knew Vivian wasn't far behind."
Vivian Campbell - "This is Holy Diver material this. And there's Wendy."
Phil Collen - "You can tell though. Same director. There was gonna be some bondage at some point in the later videos - there's my guitar!."
Joe Elliott - "That's cool. I do think that looks good."
Rick Savage - "What has the girl got to do with anything?."
Joe Elliott - "I don't know other than she looks a bit like Elizabeth Taylor with a tattoo on her face."
Phil Collen - "There's the little bondage thing. It keeps coming up in the David Mallet videos. I don't know if notice there's a bit of a theme."
Vivian Campbell - "Curious. Is he English?."
Phil Collen - "He is yeah."
Vivian Campbell - "Oh there you go. Say no more."
Rick Allen - "There he is."
Vivian Campbell - "Yeah Richard don't look at the camera quite so much."
Rick Allen - "Yeah I know. Good advice Joe."
Joe Elliott - "I look like Ronnie James Dio with a sword. Very sad. Bit taller."
Phil Collen - "But it was cool you know because rock bands hadn't really been seen. This was another one of the reasons we done so well in the States. You know it was all radio and a lot of the bands that had been around for years actually didn't wanna do this. It was about the music man. It wasn't about how we look and we said no, that's cool."
Rick Allen - "It's great."
Joe Elliott - "And there's the 'It's Better To Burn Out, Than Fade Away' shirt with the line. Where I nicked the line from, I didn't know at the time it was a Neil Young line. But I do now."
Watch all the Pyromania album promo videos on this YouTube Playlist
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- Def Leppard - Rock Of Ages Single Section
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- Previous News - 8th December 2016