Four Critical Years

I wanted to write more this week, but time was not my ally. There’s lots of good stuff in today’s show, but I wanted to ask about Def Leppard.

I was home for Labor Day weekend and my brother was playing one of those countdown shows on Spotify. It was the Top 100 Cassettes of all time. The premise was that people voted for the best cassettes they bought and the DJs (actually former VJs) chose the music from those records.

Hysteria ranked higher than Pyromania which is totally unacceptable. Setting aside Def Leppard fans, I’m curious how those albums rank. They’re important because they straddle the transition from Heavy Metal to Hair Metal as far as sound if not look.

I gave up on Def Leppard and “metal” generally by the time Hysteria came out. My brother did as well. Our wives, who are only a little younger than us enthusiastically defended Hysteria (this is the part where I don’t make a misogynistic joke).

The difference is really between people who heard a record in grammar school and people who heard it in high school. Or maybe it’s better to say “middle school” to capture the 9th graders as well.

If you have an opinion, I’d love to hear it. You can comment below or shoot me an email. I excluded Def Leppard “fans” because if you know more than these two records (except maybe Long Through the Night), then the band appeals to you at a different level than it does the casual listener.