JOE ELLIOTT Says DIAMOND STAR HALOS Album Is A Quantum Leap For DEF LEPPARD

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Saturday, 30th April 2022

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Def Leppard 2022

Def Leppard singer Joe Elliott was recently interviewed by German radio and discussed the new Diamond Star Halos album.

'Diamond Star Halos' is the band's 12th studio album.

As announced on 17th March it will be released on Friday 27th May 2022.

Joe spoke to Radio 21 in Germany recently with video available which can be viewed below.

Joe talked about the new Diamond Star Halos album, how it was started, the writing and recording, working remotely and how he feels it is a huge step forward for the band.

Career Defining Album

Joe said that he believes this is a "career defining album" in the same way that classic albums for The Eagles and Fleetwood Mac were for them in the 1970s and 1980s.

A Quantum Leap For The Band

Joe talked excitedly about this album being 'a quantum leap' for the band.

And that he thinks fans are ready to hear them do new things which many of the songs do. This is a reference to the four songs that feature both Alison Krauss and Mike Garson as guests.

Classic Leppard Songs

As mentioned in other recent interview or reviews a few of the new songs are described as classic Leppard tracks.

As well as Kick Joe said that these songs - 'Gimme A Kiss', 'SOS Emergency', 'Fire It Up', all have a classic Leppard feel.

The Classic Rock magazine review of the album includes 'Gimme A Kiss' and 'SOS Emergency' as some of the standout tracks alongside 'All We Need', 'Open Your Eyes', and 'Unbreakable'.

Visit the Tour News section. For more news on future tour plans.

Visit the Album News section for more news on new music (based on band member quotes).

Joe Elliott/Radio 21 - April 2022 Interview Quotes - (Transcribed by dltourhistory)

Fans Wanting New Music/New Album

"OK well if you're a Def Leppard fan I would imagine there's always a need to listen some new music, because as much as it's great to have this, you know, massive back catalogue of music."

"New music is what keeps a band alive. So we want to share that with our fans."

"Why do they want to listen to it?. Well I believe that this is a career defining album. For a band that's been around now for 45 years to make an album that's this strong I believe."

"At this part of our career is is actually quite an achievement you know. There's - I've been comparing this situation, not the album, but i've been comparing the situation with Diamond Star Halos for Def Leppard. I think is capable of being what Hotel California was for The Eagles or Rumours was for Fleetwood Mac."

"And what I mean by that is what came before was fine, there was nothing wrong with it. In fact The Eagles Greatest Hits, which was their previous album, to Hotel California, is one of the biggest telling records of all time. It speaks for itself."

"And the Fleetwood Mac scenario of the Peter Green years, the Jeremy Spencers. It was all brilliant stuff, but then they put out Rumours and Eagles put out Hotel California and it was a quantum leap."

"I believe that this album is a quantum leap. It's not a re-hash of Pyromania or Hysteria or any of our albums. It's got all the flavors that Def Leppard have had in the past but it's got some new explorations that we've never done."

"That I think our audience are ready for this journey because it's 35 years since Hysteria was released. It's 39 since Pyromania came out. And our audience are also older like we are."

"So I think they're ready to hear something a little different, you know, like I said it's still got plenty of Def Leppard stuff, Gimme A Kiss, that rocks. SOS Emergency, Fire It Up, Kick. They're all classic Def Leppard."

"But there's some stuff that just, like our heroes Queen, it just goes off on tangents that are a little different to the stuff that they've done in the past."

Ending Album/Writing Kick Single

"So you know keeping it fresh is bringing in Mike Garson on the piano, bringing in Alison Krauss. Writing remotely and and taking our time to make sure that it was all good you know. We didn't have to rush it we didn't have a record deal when we started this album. We didn't have a delivery date."

"So we were just recording as artists for fun. There was no end game to worry about. We've got to get it done for now."

"That came literally right at the very end when we had the 14 songs recorded. And Phil phoned me up one day and he says 'I've just written a stone with Dave Bassett' who was this songwriter guy in LA. And he says I think you should hear it."

So I he sent me an MP3, like five minutes later I'm listening to it. And I'm texting him back going 'You've got to be kidding me, we've got to do this'.

"So all of a sudden we have this 15th song and this is how exciting it was. And as soon as we had that song done and we by then got a record deal in place. We literally had to finish it pretty quick because of vinyl. There's like an eight-month delay on getting vinyl pressed."

"And if we wanted this album out we needed to get the album delivered as soon as we could. So we got this song finished to the standard that we wanted it finished to. And that was Kick which is the first song that we've released off the album."

"So it shows you how important a last song can be, because this happened to us on the Hysteria album. The last song written for a Hysteria was Pour Some Sugar On Me. Which is arguably the most important song on that album. If not our entire career so far."

"So, you know, keeping it fresh is, it was just, it was just natural. It was an obvious thing with this record, because it was so different it couldn't help but be fresh. We've never worked like this before."

Buy 'Diamond Star Halos' Online

Amazon - Regular CD
Amazon - Deluxe CD
Amazon - Vinyl
Amazon - MP3

Diamond Star Halos - Tracklisting

01 - Take What You Want - 4:14
02 - Kick - 3:42 - (Collen) - Amazon - (MP3)
03 - Fire It Up - 3:19
04 - This Guitar [feat. Alison Krauss] - 3:50
05 - SOS Emergency - 3:25
06 - Liquid Dust - 4:01
07 - U Rok Mi - 3:33
08 - Goodbye For Good This Time - 4:27
09 - All We Need - 4:46
10 - Open Your Eyes - 4:19
11 - Gimme A Kiss - 3:12
12 - Angels (Can’t Help You Now) - 4:57
13 - Lifeless [feat. Alison Krauss] - 4:19 - (Collen/Elliott)
14 - Unbreakable - 3:46
15 - From Here To Eternity - 5:37