Yeah!

I am not kidding.

Reach for those stonewashed jeans and black t-shirts, because the Lep is back with the best record they've done since 1987's Hysteria.

Yeah! is a collection of classic rawk covers, Def Leppard's homage to the bands that made them pick up guitars in the first place. You really have to set aside all music pretentions to enjoy this one, but it's worth the sacrifice.

The album kicks off with twenty seconds of guitars - layers and layers and layers of guitars. And a fist-pumping "Yeah!" scream backed by a ton of reverb. And then there's the hand-clap percussion...

They cover tunes by T-Rex, Badfinger, Thin Lizzy, and the Faces.

They cover that CHEESY song "Rock On" from that '80s movie with the Coreys, Dream a Little Dream.

On a semi-related note, I saw Def Leppard when they landed in Springfield the summer after 8th grade. 1987. The Hysteria tour. A bunch of us guys went with some young ladies from the local Catholic junior high. That's right, nasty parochial school girls. One of 'em sat on my shoulders for "Pour Some Sugar on Me" and threw her bra on the stage. Yep, that was Springfield Illinois in the 80s.