In an Interview on Rockline radio, two band members, Joe Elliott and Vivian Campbell stated that the title of their latest studio album would be Songs from the Sparkle Lounge, saying that "Until someone comes up with a better name this will be the final title upon release". They also mentioned the possibility of previous Def Leppard album producerMutt Lange being involved with a few songs for the album, but in the end this collaboration did not turn out to be possible due to scheduling conflicts. However, Joe Elliott has stated that the band and Mutt Lange still plan to work on a few songs together in the future. In an interview with Billboard.com, Joe Elliott stated that the album title is a reference to a backstage tuning room at shows where the band would work on new material. "It was a mini kit, mini amps, a tape recorder and sparkly lights." Vivian Campbell also commented on the origin of the "Sparkle Lounge" in an article from Goldmine, mentioning that that room was rife with both brainstorming and "little Christmas lights, little fairy lights." Elliott also stated that they would not be performing any previews of the songs, as they did not want them appearing on websites such as YouTube prior to the release of the album. Members of the band have described the tracks from the album as written in the style of Hysteria, with the production style of High 'n' Dry. The album's first single, "Nine Lives" features country singerTim McGraw. Joe Elliott has stated at the band's official site that the concept of this album is that it sounds more like "early 70's AC/DC" and much like Led Zeppelin's song "Rock and Roll". The title of one of the songs in the track list, "Give It Away," was changed to "Gotta Let It Go." On 25 April 2008, Def Leppard's record label opened a website with teasers of every song on the album. The band performed "Love" with Taylor Swift for their 2008 CMT Crossroads episode Taylor Swift and Def Leppard. Their performance of the song was not included in the actual episode, but is included as a bonus performance for the episode's DVD released exclusively to US Wal-Mart stores by Big Machine Records on 16 June 2009. It was the only post-1995 song of Def Leppard's catalogue that was performed for that project. The album debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200, selling about 55,000 copies in its first week of release. It is the band's shortest album to date.
Reception
Songs from the Sparkle Lounge received mixed reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received a score of 47, based on 8 reviews. Alun Williams of About.com gave the album 4.5 out of 5 stars and said "This album is so instant: huge hooks, big choruses and awesome production!"
