Concert preview: Def Leppard with Poison and Cheap Trick at Superpages.com Center (August 21)

by Justin Press of Justin Press: Dallas Rock Music Examiner

The urban hipsters may snicker at the bill of Def Leppard, Poison, and Cheap Trick at Superpages.com Center on Friday, August 21 (though they’ll claim they’re down with Cheap Trick since it’s the hip thing to say, same with Motorhead), but with 174 million albums sold amongst the three of them and two of the seminal albums of the rock era (Hysteria and At Budokan) were crafted by the acts here, I say screw the hipsters! This is the perfect summer bill of clean, melodic rock void of sarcasm and just moist with good times.

Def Leppard are still to this day a great live band and have a catalog as deep as core of the Earth. Front man Joe Elliot is a pure rock star, non-delusional and just a punter to the end. From Mott The Hoople to Thin Lizzy, he is the essence of a British rocker. Their latest, Songs From The Sparkle Lounge, was not a departure but a throwback to their rhythm and harmonic style with rockers, ballads, and anthems loaded on both sides of the record. As a live entity, expect roughly ¾ of the entire Hysteria record to be played -- hell, it was almost a greatest hits record, with 20 million units moved in 1987-88 alone. Dudes, chicks, and everything in between can agree that Def Leppard is a stellar band, closet pleasure or not.

Poison made a great debut album of bubblegum hard pop and glam. Since then they have squired on with a smash in “Every Rose Has Its Thorn,” and lately Bret Michaels has mated with every pole dancer from Dallas to Des Moines on Rock of Love and fancies himself the Kenny Chesney of rock (though Chesney has bigger pyro). Nonetheless, Poison are a guilty pleasure even for those of us who own Slayer’s Reign In Blood.

Cheap Trick, always the wild card, may seem a bit out of their element here, but honestly they branded this kind of melodic hard rock back when these bands were skipping 5th grade math class. Regardless of their time in the trenches, they may well be one of the top 5 live bands out today. They have a wealth of material, Robin Zander’s vocals, and the ability to not be saddled by today’s make or break music industry. “Surrender” is right up there with “My Generation” as an institution to youthful anxiety. Their third album, Heaven Tonight, was a turning point and showed us all that masturbating to your babysitter was going to put you “on top of the world.” And name me one soul who doesn’t just turn up the volume a bit more when “I Want You To Want Me” comes on the stereo. It’s the perfect rock song, bar none.