Sometimes, when you buy a bootleg CD you have no idea what you are buying. This is one of those cases. I couldn’t find anything about the release other than the front cover. All it said was “Def Leppard – Live Bites” and it listed out a handful of classic Leppard songs. And it was cheap. Those two things were all I had to go on, so I bought it.
When I received the CD in the mail, It didn’t offer much else to it either. It did have a full track listing, but it was only 11 songs and from the looks of it, not a full live show…only pieces. There were two songs from ‘Slang’ and nothing later that told me it was from around 1997 at the very least. There was nothing in the booklet…ha! booklet…one sheet of paper…so not really a booklet…that gave me any indication of where these songs were recorded. The back of the CD had something that said the following…
Having sold over 65 million albums worldwide since their debut release in 1980 and proved themselves as one of rock music’s hardest working and consistently powerful live bands, Def Leppard remain one of only five rock groups who can claim two separate original 10 million-plus selling albums.
The Scorpions camp felt it was time for another live album. This would be the band’s third to date and was released April 3, 1995. Now, the disc is not one show as that would be the smart thing to do and this instead is the easy way out. They took shows from several concerts from 1988 to 1994. The cities were Leningrad (Russia), San Francisco (US), Mexico City (Mexico), Berlin (Germany) and Munich (Germany). The album has the normal crew of Klaus Meine, Rudolf Schenker, Mathais Jabs, Herman Rarebell and current bass player, Ralph Rieckermann. However, most of the bass playing is long time member Francis Buchholz. The best thing about the album is that they did include 3 studio tracks which is the real reason to buy. No definitive time on the recordings, but I believe they range for 1988-1995, just no where I can prove that out.
As far as live albums go, it does sound fantastic. The guitar sound is actually killer, almost to amazing which makes me wonder if any touch up was done. And Klaus’ vocals are spot on, the drum sound is hard and heavy. There is no denying these boys can play live. They kick off with “Tease Me Please Me” and it would be a good song to start with as it totally rocks out and gets you on your feet. Then we get a real treat with the ‘Lovedrive’ track “Is There Anybody There”. I love the reggae vibe to the song. I really unexpected choice for the live show, but very welcomed. Really cool. Back to the heavy rock guitar sound with “Rhythm of Love” and they nail it here before going in to the only song that is a found on another live album and that is the fantastic “In Trance” and this is a classic track. Man is it good.
The first misstep for me is “No Pain No Gain” as I’m not a fan of this song, but they do make it sound a little better than the studio track here. It fits better in the live setting than album setting, but not by much. Then from ‘Blackout’ we get “When the Smoke is Going Down” and another surprise track for me. I didn’t like this song as the ending to that album, but mixed here in the middle of the show and listening to Klaus sound incredible on this one, I dig it here. Next up is “Living for Tomorrow” and this song had been released previously on the 1992 compilation called ‘Still Loving You’. On here, two slow songs in a row really can start to drag the show down. Klaus speaks to the crowd in Russian as it was recorded in Leningrad.
2 Loud 2 Old Music 