This section looks at the 'Promises/Back In Your Face' UK single release. The first single taken from the 'Euphoria' album.
"It is rock and it absolutely sounds like Def Leppard."
Def Leppard released their classic double A-Side single classic single Promises/Back In Your Face on this day in 1999 in the UK.
The first single to be released from the Euphoria album.
The single had been released on 12th July 1999 and the first from the band since November 1996's 'Breathe A Sigh'.
It's release came almost six weeks after the live TV appearance on TFI Friday which didn't help its chart position.
The promo video was filmed in May 1999 at Laser Images Studios in Van Nuys, CA and at the Griffith Park Observatory in Los Angeles, CA.
The single was released on two CD singles with both 'Promises' and 'Back In Your Face' taking turns as the lead track.
Def Leppard 1999
CD1 had 'Promises' as song 1 with BIYF as track two plus a selection of albums snippets as track 3 (Demolition Man/Day After Day/All Night). The Enhanced CD also included the promo video which was playable on PC's as a Quicktime file.
CD2 had 'Back In Your Face' as track 1 and Promises as track 2 with a new B-Side called 'Worlds Collide' that had been recorded for the 'Slang' sessions.
Two different UK promo CDs featured only 'Promises' on one and both tracks on the other.
A European CD single was also released that only included Promises as track 1. 'Worlds Collide', more album snippets and the Alice Cooper cover 'Under My Wheels'. This cover would only be released on this CD single and the Australian version of the 'Euphoria' album. Featuring only Joe and Phil and remixed from their contribution to the 'Humanary Stew' tribute album.
Read some quotes about the song below.
Rick Savage - June 1999 Interview Quote
"The one thing we did like about Promises is that for a four minute song it's instantly Def Leppard. It's got all the ingredients of how people remember Def Leppard and how I think how people want to hear Def Leppard."
Joe Elliott (on Mutt Lange) - June 1999 Interview Quotes
"As we were plowing on into the album, we got a couple of songs on the go that we pretty much met a dead-end with. Collectively the five of us and Pete, had dried up. We'd get them to a certain level and then hit a brick wall. No matter how many times we tried to drive around this thing, it was always in the way. So we did what was the best thing to do which was get Mutt involved again. Because he understands and knows how to draw out the best out of us. And he said he'd love to."
"He was actually busy at the time but he freed himself up a couple of weeks after the first initial phone call. We sent him a tape of what was the backing track of Promises and he played with it over at his studio. And over the phone and fax he came up with these great melody and lyrical ideas. And that was how Promises was done then. We actually asked whether he'd like to physically come over and hang with us in the studio for a few days. And he did a month later. He came over to Dublin for an extremely long weekend. During that four-day period, we came up with that song All Night."
Def Leppard 1999
Phil Collen - June 1999 Interview Quotes
"So that is what we did. We went back and literally we sort of did another 'greatest hits'. We looked back at some of our songs and just gave them that treatment. We just tried to evoke some of those same feelings when we did some of them songs. The prime one is probably the first single, "Promises". It kind of reminds me of Pyromania and "Photograph" type Def Leppard. It is kind of up and it is rock and it absolutely sounds like Def Leppard."
"So that is what we went with. It was funny, when we actually went to record some of this stuff, as soon as it started sounding like that we were like, "Wow!" It was almost like we forgot how to do that. It was a complete hoot. We tried to get away from it before because it got burned out. I mean, literally like Bryan Adams and God knows how many bands sounded like us, I'm not knocking him at all, but some of his stuff sounded similar. And what happens is that people just get fed up. That is what happens with all movements after a while, like the grunge thing became a parody of itself. I think throughout the '90's we were afraid of doing anything that sounded like Def Leppard up until this point."
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