somebody.’ So he takes me upstairs to this room
with a snooker table, and Bowie’s sitting on the
table. Bono goes: ‘I thought you might like five
minutes.’ I’m like: ‘You could have fucking told me.
What am I gonna say? How’s your mum, David?’”
The pair hit it off, to the point where Elliott soon
found himself crammed into a car with Bowie and
the barbecue’s host. “Me, Bono and Bowie hijacked
a Mini and drove to this restaurant where the Edge
was having a meal cos it was his birthday. We
pulled up, jumped out of the car, sang Happy
Birthday to the Edge, jumped back in and drove
back to Bono’s.”
Earlier today, Elliott had mentioned the version
of All The Young Dudes that Bowie recorded duringthe Aladdin Sane sessions.
“He said: ‘I’ve never heard
that since I did it.’ And I said: [disbelievingly] ‘What,
you don’t have it? I’ve got it on a Japanese bootleg.’
And he goes: ‘Can you get me a copy?’ He was
playing The Point in Dublin the next night, so I did
a tape of it and gave it to him just before he went on
stage. He went: “Thank you,” slipped it in his suit
jacket pocket and went straight out on the stage.”
This combination of fandom and fearlessness
got the young Joe Elliott into places where less
bolshy souls would fear to tread. He queued to get
his copy of Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers’
debut album signed after he saw them opening for
Nils Lofgren in Sheffield in 1976. The followingyear he “broke into” the
dressing room of the
Doncaster Gaumont to
meet Ian Hunter and his
solo band. “‘Can I get
your autographs?’ ‘Yeah,
come on in.’”
Not every encounter
with one of his idols was
so happy, though.
Leppard had just
released Pyromania when
he bumped into Thin
Lizzy frontman Phil
Lynott at Frank’s Funny
Farm studio in West
Sussex. “I said: ‘I’m Joe
from Def Leppard.
I wanted to say hi.’ And
he said: ‘I know. I heard your album, and it’s the
reason I’m splitting up the band.’”
Elliott shakes his head. “What can you say? It’s
the most backhanded compliment you can get.
I wish I’d had the balls to slam him against a wall
and go: ‘Well, you should just write a fucking
better record. Don’t quit on us.’”C
ontrary to the impression he gives, Elliott
does listen to music made after 1980. “But
not much,” he concedes. He’s heard the
Greta Van Fleet album (“Once,” he says, non-JOE ELLIOTT
“If there’s one thing
I cannot stand, it’s
rap. I don’t mind
stuff like Run-
DMC or Beastie
Boys, but all
this new stuff...
Dude, just sing me
a f**king melody.”
“See^ this^ [Mott]?^ Different^
heads all superimposed^ on^ the^
same body.^ I^ think^ it’s^ Ralphers^
[guitarist^ Mick^ Ralphs].”66 CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM“Sparks. Genius band.”