Def Leppard drummer Rick Allen spoke to STUFF.co.nz before the last show of 2008 in Auckland, New Zealand. Interviewver Simon Sweetman has posted exerts from his chat with Rick on his blog.

Rick Allen Interview Quotes

When Allen got to Hysteria and described it as a Mammoth he referenced his car accident himself. I could tell this was an experienced interviewee, a very giving human being and he would be a blast to interview.

"I credit being here, in the band, to our producer of the time, Mutt Lange, just the kindest person in the world. A man who was so selfless in visiting me, in looking after me. I remember," and Allen stops to form a small smile, "Mutt telling me he knew an Indian couple that made lovely food and that they would feed me. Pretty soon the entire ward of the hospital smelled like an Indian restaurant because they would go from room to room serving food to anyone and everyone in the hospital."

There are some happy enough memories but it was a testing time.

"Not only did I have doubt in myself and whether I could do this thing again - play my instrument - but the band had to have doubts too and they'd be lying if they said they didn't. And I think that is probably the moment when we all realised just how tight this band was in terms of friendship. In terms of us knowing that we were all in this together and it was about the greater good, about making music together as a way to express something and as an excuse and reason for some camaraderie."

"Well, for me personally, and I don't know if this is a shared band feeling, but for me, our album Slang was great. And it was lumped in as being our attempt to be part of the grunge era - which of course we could never do. But that was a really exciting time in music and we loved a lot of that stuff - bands like Soundgarden, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, it was really exciting. And music became about going to the gig all over again and as fans of music we loved that. Loved it. And we wanted to reflect that with Slang - I'm not sure it worked though." He chuckles and decides that'll do with regard to Slang.

We move to Songs from the Sparkle Lounge, the band's latest. An album they are - as would always be the party-line in an interview - "tremendously proud of". Allen explains that the concept of the "Sparkle Lounge" is "an area that is mobile that we set up between shows on the last tour, between places when we wanted to record something...and you know the songs have just evolved from there. I think it's great. But we know that people want to bond with the hits so we are not about to play our new album in its entirety."
By STUFF 2008.

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Source -- Rick Allen Interviews