Def Leppard kicked off their ‘Rock ‘N Roll Double-Header’ tour June 1st in Portland, Oregon (home of METAL SHOP) – every concert is happening in a minor league baseball park this summer. This is a cool idea – standing in the open-air with a cold beer listening to one of my favorite bands is not a bad way to spend the day.
It was great to see all the fans – which I’m sure I hung with 18 years ago on the ‘In the Round’ tour – they just looked a little older. But we partied hard and I never expected to be at a Def Leppard show slow dancing with my wife when they played ‘Hysteria,’ but we did and it was nice. And if you have kids under 12, they get in free with an adult. That sounds great on the surface – I have 2 kids, but I didn’t bring ’em to this show.
The only problem with letting the kids in is I’m assuming the band had to pay more attention to lyrics, so they didn’t perform ‘High ‘N Dry’ (Saturday – I feel right, I’ve been drinking all day) or ‘Let It Go’ (and you’re bitchin’). I was dying to hear both, but it didn’t happen. They did play all the other great stuff though, including ‘Bringing on the Heartbreak.’
It’s great to hear new music from our favorite 80’s bands, but when we go to see them in concert, we wanna hear the stuff that made them great and Def Leppard didn’t disappoint – unlike the Scorpions last year. The fans were fired up and didn’t come down until the end – ‘Photograph,’ ‘Animal,’ ‘Rock of Ages’… all back-to-back, then ‘Bringing on the Heartbreak’ and ‘Pour Some Sugar on Me’ for the encore.
It was a great show – even with Bryan Adams opening (ha) – METAL SHOP highly recommends it.
Thanks to Shannon Herber at Universal for hooking us up and check out pictures from the June 5th L.A. show – METAL SHOP correspondent Ralph Cartel was there and got some great close-ups -Rich Rock.
[print_gllr id=1733]