Taking Sides: Def Leppard's Yeah! vs Styx's Big Bang Theory vs Toto's Through the Looking Glass

http://www.dickdestiny.com/blog/2006/06/wham-bam-british-glam-def-leppards.html

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If you live near a Walmart, you can also pick up a bonus CD for $5.88 that includes 5 more songs and three interviews:

1 - American Girl (Tom Petty)
2 - Backstage Interview #1.
3 - Search & Destroy (Iggy & The Stooges)
4 - Backstage Interview #2.
5 - Space Oddity (David Bowie)
6 - Backstage Interview #3.
7 - Dear Friends (Queen)
8 - Heartbeat (Jobriath)

The interesting thing on this disc is this isn't technically the band - each song is by a subset of the band or is solo ("Search & Destroy" is guitarist Phil Collen singing and playing everything, "Space Oddity" is Joe Elliot doing the same, and "Dear Friends" has bassist Rick Savage handling everything) and two tracks find the members supplemented by non-members ("American Girl" and "Heartbeat.") Somehow it still manages to sound like Def Leppard.

But we're not done with bonuses. Best Buy has to get in on the fun, too. Their version adds two tracks to the original 14 track lineup:

15 - No Matter What (Live 2005) (Badfinger)
16 - Winter Song (Lindisfarne)

Believe it or not, there are still more bonus tracks. Even Target has to get in on this action:

15 - Action (Live 2005) (Sweet)
16 - When I'm Dead And Gone (McGuinness Flint)

If you're adding that up, that makes nine additional songs available on three different CDs to choose from. If you really want them all, you're in luck, this week at least - everyone has Yeah! on sale. Best Buy and Target both have it for $9.99, and you can price-match it at Best Buy to Circuit City's $7.99 if you still have this weekend's ad. For about $24 total, you effectively double the album's length. This is one of the few times when I think it might actually be worth investing the time and money into getting all these versions.

The interesting thing on this disc is this isn't technically the band - each song is by a subset of the band or is solo ("Search & Destroy" is guitarist Phil Collen singing and playing everything, "Space Oddity" is Joe Elliot doing the same, and "Dear Friends" has bassist Rick Savage handling everything) and two tracks find the members supplemented by non-members ("American Girl" and "Heartbeat.") Somehow it still manages to sound like Def Leppard.

These match the pictures in the booklet, like of Collen Photoshopped as Iggy on the cover of "Raw Power," Savage on the cover of "Queen II," etc. No Walmarts anywhere near Pasadena, though, soCal doing a good job of keeping them out. Plenty of Targets, though.

In this case, at least the Wal-Mart exclusive is on a separate disc - my local Wal-Mart was selling it alone for $5.88 or so, with no requirement to purchase the regular album.

Lindisfarne is another early-70s folk-rock aggregate a la Family and Fairport. Someone popular too as I recall. They were on the same label (Charisma) as Genesis and shared a couple of tours together.