For My Sunday Song #99, we will tackle the Def Leppard power ballad, “Love Bites”. The song is off the Diamond selling album, ‘Hysteria’ and was Def Leppard’s biggest hit, if you can believe it. It is the only Def Leppard song to reach #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Considering this was the fifth single off the album and with the success of “Pour Some Sugar on Me”, I was completely surprised by that fact (PSSOM did go to #2).
The song was originally brought to the band by the legendary producer Robert John “Mutt” Lange. The song was a country song at the time and of course the band put their spin on it and turned it in to of the great rock power ballads of the time. The title for the song actually came from another song that Leppard was working on and that song later became “I Wanna Be Your Hero” which was the B-Side for “Animal” in the US.
What I like about the song is that the guy is so in love with this person that he is actually going a little nuts. Hell, just touching her drives him crazy. But he isn’t sure she feels the same way. He keeps questioning her. Maybe it is really his own insecurities that are causing him to doubt the relationship. Or maybe she doesn’t love him and he really senses something missing.
It is such a heartfelt, emotive song. The band plays it slow and easy with a little punch at times. The lyrics paint a great picture that you can visualize exactly what is going through the guys mind and you might have even experienced those feelings as well. What I also loved about it is that it isn’t your typical ballad at the time. The overall sound was light years ahead of the typical ballad of the time. It was a much more mature sound and wasn’t as gimmicky of some ballads of the time.
At the end of the song is the phrase…”Yes it does / It will be hell”…which is done in a little softer, darker and in a raspy tone. The rumor was always that the band was saying “Jesus of Nazareth, Go to Hell”. Of course, the band has denied said rumor and I have to say that I never heard that when listening to it.
There you have it. Give it a listen and let me know what you think. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have. Happy Sunday!!
“Love Bites”
Watch out, love bitesWhen you make love, do you look in the mirror?
Who do you think of, does he look like me?
Do you tell lies and say that it’s forever?
Do you think twice, or just touch ‘n’ see?
Ooh babe ooh yeah
When you’re alone, do you let go?
Are you wild ‘n’ willin’ or is it just for show?
Ooh c’mon
I don’t wanna touch you too much baby
‘Cos making love to you might drive me crazy
I know you think that love is the way you make it
So I don’t wanna be there when you decide to break it
No!
Love bites, love bleeds
It’s bringin’ me to my knees
Love lives, love dies
It’s no surprise
Love begs, love pleads
It’s what I need
When I’m with you are you somewhere else?
Am I gettin’ thru or do you please yourself?
When you wake up will you walk out?
It can’t be love if you throw it about
Ooh babe
I don’t wanna touch you too much baby
‘Cos making love to you might drive me crazy
[Repeat Chorus]
[guitar solo]
Ooh yeah
[Repeat Bridge]
Love bites, love bleeds
It’s bringin’ me to my knees
Love lives, love dies
[Repeat Chorus]
If you’ve got love in your sights
Watch out, love bites
Yes it does
It will be hell
2 Loud 2 Old Music 
Classic song! I love Animal! Your blog is awesome!
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Animal is a great song as well. And thank you so much! I am glad you came by and checked things out, much appreciated!
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I’ve never heard that Jesus rumour before. Man they had it in for rock in the 80’s out of here didn’t they? Great post Man. Loved it
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Thanks so much. I thought that rumor was widely known, glad you learned something new about the song.
Yes, back in the 80’s, if you were hard rock or metal, parents thought it was such a bad influence on their kids and blamed the music for anything that went wrong with their child rather than take the blame themselves
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Maybe the rumour never made it back across the to the UK. Def Leppard were always considered the cuddly nice guys in the UK Rock Scene.
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Makes sense. Plus it did take a long time before they got really popular over there. I think they hit it big here in the States before they got much love from back home.
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You’re right. They were club famous here from the off. Then they went to the US and got Michael Jackson famous and we just couldn’t see how or why. There was a lot of silly talk of them
“Selling out” in the UK when all they did was become a success. It was pure jealousy
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The song is actually about me and the fact Sarah wouldn’t go out with me when I was 14. Fact!
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I think I might actually believe that.
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I wouldn’t have guessed this was the only #1 – I’ll be interested to see what the milestone Sunday song #100 is next week!
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Well, I didn’t treat it as a milestone one. It is just the end of the power ballad list of songs before I move on to just putting the next 10 at 10 of my favorite songs again.
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Milestone or no, I look forward to it either way!
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Very interesting. I don’t know much about Def Leppard other than my brother liked them for a spell and I started listening to some of their albums a few years back due to the constant posts about Def Leppard’s awesomeness from a lot of our mutual blogging pals. Not sure this track is one for me… especially cause I was a ‘grunge lad’ growing up.
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Understandable. I was never a grunge guy. Although there are a few bands I did like from that era.
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This is definitely one of my favorite Def Leppard songs.
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Great Writeup!
It still boggles my mind that all of Side 1 was released as singles from Hysteria…
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Hah! I never knew what the ending lyrics were before!
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I’m sorry you don’t like what it’s saying at the end of the song , however the words are clearly go to hell not it is hell and the other part is jesus of Nazareth not yes it is , I Cannot agree with you. How can you mistake the word Go with the word it?????
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I don’t think I ever said I don’t like what it says at the end. I think I said I don’t hear the jesus of nazareth part. And also, I didn’t write the lyrics, I only included what someone else had done with the lyrics. You hear what you want to hear and I’ll hear what I want. It is like Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer”…I hear Tony Danza…others might not!! 🙂
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I like def lepp but you can’t deny what is being said At the end of the song just because you don’t like it and you want to change it to yes it is and it will be hell The part that says go to hell is clearly a lot louder than the part that mentions Jesus so I’m sure you should be able to focus on that at the very least being that it is loud enough to hear so with that being said how can you not hear that it is saying go to hell not it is hell
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Again..wow…why does it bother you that I hear something different. And again…I never said I didn’t like it.
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@2Loud2OldMusic
It definitely says “Jesus of Nazareth, go to hell.” It is easy to hear when you turn up the volume at the end. I liked Def Leppard before, but was done with them after hearing that. What an evil thing for them to put at the end of that song. Despicable.
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