Tag: Only After Dark

Def Leppard – ‘Retro Active’ (1993) – Album Review (The Def Leppard Collection Series)

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The band was now five albums in but it had been 12 years total. Not a great track record. They wanted to not have 4 years or more between albums again so it was decided to release a compilation album to hold fans over until the next release. But this wasn’t any ordinary greatest hits compilation, nope…that would’ve been too easy. The band decided to pull together a bunch of rare tracks and B-sides and put them together on one release…but still…not so simple as they re-recorded parts, remixed others and gave us a solid collection of songs from their career over the span of 1984 up to 1993. It also gives us some of the last recordings of the late, great Steve Clark.

The album would be called ‘Retro Active’ and released on October 5, 1993. It would spawn three singles including “Two Steps Behind”, “Miss You In A Heartbeat” and The Sweet cover for “Action”. Both “Two Steps Behind” and “Miss You In A Heartbeat” would go Top 40 and the album would go on to sell over 1,000,000 copies in the U.S. alone. Heck, even the opening track, “Desert Storm” would hit the U.S. Mainstream Rock Chart at #12 without even being released technically as a single.

One really cool aspect of the album is the cover which was designed by Hugh Syme and Nels Israelson. The image is a photographed of a woman sitting in front of a vanity mirror. However, she is positioned just so, along with other items, so that when you moved the album further away from you it turned in to a skull. A really cool concept

The album opens up with an outtake from the ‘Hysteria’ album called “Desert Song”. It was originally recorded as an instrumental and is the last song released by the band to feature Steve Clark on guitar. In fact, it is noted as the only song in the catalog to feature both Steve and his replacement Vivian Campbell who did some background vocals on the song. I know I said it was originally an instrumental and it was, but lyrics were written when the pulled the song back out after forgetting about it for years. The song is about Mick Ronson who was dying of cancer around this time. It is a killer opening track, hard hitting and a really cool Clark tone to it which is so missed. The bass work is great on this as well as the guitars. To me, the song sounds more like it would’ve fit on ‘Slang’ then on ‘Hysteria’. A truly fantastic track.

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Def Leppard – “Let’s Get Rocked” – 12″ Picture Disc

Published on by 2loud2oldmusic58 Comments

On one of my recent trips to record shop, I scored a couple picture discs by one of my favorite bands, Def Leppard. The one we are going to talk about next is the 12″ Single Picture Disc for the song called “Let’s Get Rocked” off the band’s 1992 album ‘Adrenalize’. The first one we talked about last week was “Make Love Like A Man”. The store I bought this at is called Noble Records and is one of my favorite local record shops in Charlotte. Noble Records has a YouTube channel and he constantly posts videos of collections he has bought and what he will be putting out on the floor. When he has big collections purchased, they usually go out on a Saturday at 10am. I was watching the video and he quickly flipped past the two Def Leppard picture discs as I could tell he isn’t a fan…but I am. I knew immediately I had to have them.

I got up on Saturday, mask in hand and headed to the store. The store was packed and actually made me a little nervous. However, everyone was wearing masks and being polite. Although I am not 100% sure we were following perfect Covid social distancing protocol, I was willing to take the risk. I went in and told Dillion what I was looking to get and he told me where they were (if they were still there and someone didn’t already have them in hand. I went through that stack and lo and behold, they were still there. I grabbed them, paid for them and got out in maybe 5 minutes and immediately hand sanitized my hands. I was so excited to grow my Def Leppard collection a little more.

The single “Let’s Get Rocked” was the first single off the ‘Adrenalize’ album and did pretty good going to #15 on the Billboard charts. The song is a mindless fun track about a teenager disobeying their parents and yet it was filled with sexual innuendo after sexual innuendo. It isn’t my favorite track on the album, but it is still a good time track and they still play it in their live shows regularly. The most important thing about this song is the question is asks you at the very beginning…”Do You Want To Get Rocked?”. And the answer is always…YES!

This was one of the last songs written for the album as the band had finished riding the song “White Lightning” which is about the loss of bandmate Steve Clark. After coming off such a dark song, the band needed to cut loose and have some fun and as a result, we got this bundle of joy. Despite my tiring of the song, it is pretty great even if it is overly corny. The video is a CGI filled rocking good time and is the only video the band has ever done as a four piece. Steve had passed and Vivian hadn’t yet come completely in to the picture.

The B-Side on this are two tracks. First is “Only After Dark” which is a cover of a song written by Mick Ronson and Scott Richardson. The vinyl, however, only has Mick Ronson credited which is interesting. It is a glam rock song with a little new wave edge to it. It would later be released on the band’s album ‘Retro Active’.

The second B-Side is a live version of “Too Late For Love” which was recorded at McNichols Arena, Denver, Colorado on 12 & 13 February 1988. Now, I am guessing by listing both dates that this song was pieced together from two performances of the song which seems very odd to me. However, the two dates are the dates they recorded the shows for their In Your Face, In the Round concert video so that makes more sense. If you know that video, you know this song. It is fantastic.

And there you have it, the second of the two Picture Discs I picked up at Noble Records. Really great finds and so happy to have them in my collection. Thanks for stopping by and hanging for a little while.