YOU GUYS — Rick Savage just dropped a bomb about Def Leppard's sound that is going to change how you listen to their records forever! He revealed that roughly 80% of Hysteria’s jangly guitar parts were actually played by HIM, not the original guitarist Phil Taylor. And it gets even better: Savage also played every single keyboard part on that album — including that iconic synth arpeggio intro to "When You Look At Me" and all those shimmering backing lines. So while their sound is legendary for its consistency across decades of lineup changes, a huge chunk of the actual texture was coming from one guy filling three roles!
The band has been brutally honest about this kind of story since the 70s, which makes it even better. Savage recalls Phil Taylor admitting he wasn't good at singing as far back as their 1974 album Anorak — "I was never good at all" is basically a quote from him. That honesty forced the band to bring in Jeff Williams on vocals in 1980, after which they stayed together for over twenty years before any further major changes! They actually joked about it in an interview with The Guardian and Rolling Stone both recently — Savage said he'd "probably be a better singer than Phil" now that he has more practice.
This is wild because Hysteria came out in 1981, just two years after Jeff stepped up to the mic, so savage was already pulling double duty by then! He played bass and rhythm guitar plus keyboards on top of writing lyrics for many tracks while trying not to let anyone notice he wasn't a lead guitarist. This explains why their live shows are so tight even when members rotated — the core structure remained stable because one person held multiple roles together. Go listen to Hysteria again tonight and pay attention to those guitar layers; you might just hear Rick Savage doing everything!
Source: https://www.musicradar.com/artists/they-were-far-superior-guitar-players-to-me-i-could-never-play-lead-to-save-my-life-but-one-thing-im-quite-good-at-is-playing-with-a-certain-feel-def-leppard-bassist-rick-savage-reveals-80-percent-of-Hysterias-jangle-guitars-were-him-all-along
The band has been brutally honest about this kind of story since the 70s, which makes it even better. Savage recalls Phil Taylor admitting he wasn't good at singing as far back as their 1974 album Anorak — "I was never good at all" is basically a quote from him. That honesty forced the band to bring in Jeff Williams on vocals in 1980, after which they stayed together for over twenty years before any further major changes! They actually joked about it in an interview with The Guardian and Rolling Stone both recently — Savage said he'd "probably be a better singer than Phil" now that he has more practice.
This is wild because Hysteria came out in 1981, just two years after Jeff stepped up to the mic, so savage was already pulling double duty by then! He played bass and rhythm guitar plus keyboards on top of writing lyrics for many tracks while trying not to let anyone notice he wasn't a lead guitarist. This explains why their live shows are so tight even when members rotated — the core structure remained stable because one person held multiple roles together. Go listen to Hysteria again tonight and pay attention to those guitar layers; you might just hear Rick Savage doing everything!
Source: https://www.musicradar.com/artists/they-were-far-superior-guitar-players-to-me-i-could-never-play-lead-to-save-my-life-but-one-thing-im-quite-good-at-is-playing-with-a-certain-feel-def-leppard-bassist-rick-savage-reveals-80-percent-of-Hysterias-jangle-guitars-were-him-all-along