In a recent conversation with 98.7 The Gater radio station, Def Leppard’s Joe Elliot was asked if they are “responsible for giving Motley Crue the nudge to get out on this tour”.
Joe said:
“No, I don’t think it is. We know those guys. We’ve met them all. We’ve toured with the Crue before. They opened for us in 1983 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego; that was the first time I ever saw ’em. We toured with them in the U.K. in 2011, and over the years we’ve bumped into ’em at festivals.
”And if we’d be in L.A., back in the ’80s, all you had to do was go to the Rainbow and you would bump into all four of them every night. [Laughs]
“It was nothing to do with Def Leppard specifically, but it was an idea that was put to us when they decided that if they went out with a band like us, they might [get back] together. So we had been encouraging of it, but we didn’t actually suggest it.”