In a new episode of Rockonteurs, Def Leppard frontman Joe Elliott explained why AC/DC’s ‘Highway To Hell’ and his ‘High ‘N’ Dry’ sound similar.
“We do the tour, we’re still hoping he’ll come in mench, keeps tacking away, chipping away. [He goes,] ‘All right I’ll do the next record,’ because he was between jobs or whatever,” Elliott explained while chatting about getting signed for their album ‘High ‘N’ Dry.’ “So he had us scheduled in for three months for ‘High And Dry,’ which we recorded in Battery Studios where they’d recorded all ‘Highway to Hell,’ most of ‘Back In Black’ was done in the Bahamas but they came back to Battery to mix it.”
“So our drum kit was set up where Phil Rudd’s drum kit was set up,” he said before explaining why the two records sound similar. “We were using Marshall’s the same way that Angus and Malcolm were. So we were doing it in the same studio which is why if you listen to ‘High And Dry,’ and listen to ‘Highway to Hell’ they kind of sound the same even though it’s two different bands. The only difference being harmonies ballads but one ballad and a bit more naivety because AC/DC had already six albums by the time they worked with more.”
‘High ’N’ Dry’ came out in 1981 and marked its 35th anniversary in 2016. On its 35th anniversary, Elliott chatted about the making of the record during an interview.
“When you look back at it now, there are bits of it that hit and bits of it that missed,” he said. “But generally speaking, as the second album, it was the start of where we were going to go. We were open-minded and so happy to be working with a producer like Mutt Lange. He was like a teacher and we wanted to learn from him. He was this rock guru and we were prepared to get in the pit with him and wrestle it out.”
Elliott added that recording ‘High ’N’ Dry’ was a huge learning experience for the band: “By the time we started doing ‘Pyromania’ a year later, what we’d gone through recording ‘High ’N’ Dry,’ it had sunk in and we’d realised it was worth all the effort.”
High ’N’ Dry was Pete Willis’ final full-time album with Def Leppard. It hit Number 38 on the Billboard 200 and Number 26 on the UK Albums Chart.
Episode with Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott in full, on video for the first time, out in 30mins on YouTube, here https://t.co/LfSMYg6kTm! In this clip, Joe recalls working with Mutt Lange, recording High ’N’ Dry and explains why you might hear similarities to AC/DC’s Highway to Hell. pic.twitter.com/ouAND4rLIt
— Rockonteurs (@rockonteurs) August 9, 2024
