For My Sunday Song #160 and the final in the Def Leppard series, I bring you “Die Hard the Hunter” from the multi-platinum album ‘Pyromania’.  The song was never released as a single; however, was played live back in the day.

The song opens with the sound of a helicopter and machine gun fire and is representative of war, the Vietnam War to be exact.  The song is about a war veteran who comes back from war, but can’t seem to let it go.  The battles the soldier faces being home as he can’t seem to stop fighting the battles and now they are in his mind.  The evils of war are following him everywhere and he is struggling to let go of the bad and find the good.  A common problem with soldiers then and even today.

What I love about the song is the seriousness of the music.  The heavy metal chords that are used give an impending feel of doom and gloom.  There is a darkness to the music, an eeriness, a sadness that captures the feelings the soldier is going through.  You can actually feel the heaviness of it all through the music.  It is quite fantastic how they captured that feeling musically.

Steve Clark’s solo on this is fantastic.  He has a really cool riff and along with Pete Willis’ rhythm guitar, the two made a great pair and helped deliver the sound that captured the essence of the song.  It was simple sounding, yet brilliant.  Not too flashy, but not understated either.  Joe delivers the vocals in a way to also help convey the emotions of the song.  Always has been one of my favorites on ‘Pyromania’.

Give the song a listen and let me know what you think.  I hope you enjoyed this 10 song series and hopefully you will the next 10 which will come from Needtobreathe.  Thanks and have a Happy Sunday!

“Die Hard the Hunter”

Shotgun
Let’s welcome home the soldier boy from (Far away, far away)
No angel of mercy just a need to destroy (Fire away, fire away)
Let’s toast the hero with blood in his eyes
The scars on his mind took so many lives
Die Hard the Hunter

Welcome home soldier boy
Put down your pistol, yeah, put down your toy
Yeah, they can take your gun away from you
But never take away your attitude
They can’t do that, no, they can’t do that

You got no enemy, no front line
The only battles in the back of your mind
You don’t know how to change from bad to good
You brought the war to your neighbourhood

Back in the city, he’s a man on the loose
He is the shadow that’s following you
He takes no prisoners when he’s hunting for game
He’s got a bullet and it carries your name

(Die hard) Caught in a trap
(Hunter) There’s no lookin’ back
(Die hard) He hides in the crowd
(Hunter) Die Hard and Proud

Written by Mutt Lange, Steve Clark, Rick Savage and Joe Elliott