Def Leppard and Journey kicked off their co-headlining North American tour on Saturday at St. Louis’ Busch Stadium, with support from Cheap Trick.
You can see all three set lists and video from the show below.
The lion’s share of Def Leppard’s set came from their two biggest albums, Pyromania and Hysteria, which accounted for a combined 13 of their 18 songs. They’ve reintroduced Pyromania opener “Rock! Rock! (Till You Drop)” into their set, which they hadn’t played live since 2015 prior to an intimate June show at SiriusXM’s the Garage. “Comin’ Under Fire” also appeared in the set for just the second time in the band’s history, following the Garage gig.
Journey, meanwhile, delivered well over a dozen of their requisite hits and set list staples, including “Only the Young, “Faithfully,” “Wheel in the Sky” and the set-ending “Don’t Stop Believin’.” They opened their show with Generations track “Faith in the Heartland,” a relative rarity that they’ve recently begun to unearth at a handful of shows.
Cheap Trick opened the show with a tight, hourlong hits set including classics like “Dream Police,” “If You Want My Love,” “The Flame,” “Surrender” and “I Want You to Want Me.” They’ll continue to provide support on select dates of the co-headlining tour along with Steve Miller Band. Both groups will sub for Heart on a handful of shows, as the rockers have postponed all of their 2024 North American shows for Ann Wilson to undergo preventative chemotherapy.
Def Leppard and Journey’s co-headlining tour will run through early September.
Def Leppard Promises Brand-New Stage Show on 2024 Tour
Def Leppard logged more than 80 shows between 2022 and 2023, filling stadiums around the world with Motley Crue. The British rockers begin their latest tour armed with a new single, “Just Like ’73” (which they played on Saturday), and guitarist Phil Collen recently told UCR that fans could expect a totally revamped production on this trek.
“We changed the whole set,” Collen said. “You know, there’s a whole screen [production] and we’ve been using pretty much the same stuff for like 12 years. So we’ve changed it completely. The stage show is drastically different. It’s going to take a lot of energy. There’s going to be a lot of running around. So I’m working out, trying to get the stamina up and all of that. Vocally, too. You know, I’m having to sing every single day.”
Watch Def Leppard Perform ‘Rock! Rock! (Till You Drop)’ on 7/6/24
Watch Def Leppard Perform ‘Foolin” on 7/6/24
READ MORE: 2024 Summer Tour Preview
How Journey Held It Together Amid Public Feuding
Journey, meanwhile, has already played more than three dozen shows this year as part of their ongoing Freedom tour, named after their 2022 album. It’s been a tumultuous few years for the group, full of public feuding between Neal Schon and Jonathan Cain. But the rock giants have held things together simply by putting the songs first.
“We just decided that the music is the music,” Schon recently told Los Angeles-based music journalist Lyndsey Parker. “We worked really hard and diligently on keeping this thing alive all these years, and just not let the other stuff get in the way and kind of keep it separate.”
Watch Journey Perform ‘Faith in the Heartland’ and ‘Only the Young’ on 7/6/24
Def Leppard, 7/6/24, Busch Stadium, St. Louis Set List1. “Rock! Rock! (Till You Drop)”2. “Rocket”3. “Foolin'”4. “Armageddon It”5. “Animal”6. “Love Bites”7. “Just Like ’73″8. “Comin’ Under Fire”9. “Too Late for Love”10. “Die Hard the Hunter”11. “Two Steps Behind”12. “This Guitar”13. “Bringing’ on the Heartbreak”14. “Switch 625″15. “Rock of Ages”16. “Photograph”17. “Hysteria”18. “Pour Some Sugar on Me”
Journey, 7/6/24, Busch Stadium, St. Louis Set List1. “Faith in the Heartland”2. “Only the Young”3. “Stone in Love”4. “Keep on Runnin'”5. “Faithfully”6. “Escape”7. “Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin'”8. Piano solo (Jonathan Cain)9. “Open Arms”10. “Chain Reaction”11. Guitar solo (Neal Schon)12. “Wheel in the Sky”13. “Lights”14. “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)”15. “Be Good to Yourself”16. “Any Way You Want It”17. “Don’t Stop Believin'”
Cheap Trick, 7/6/24, Busch Stadium, St. Louis Set List1. “Hello There”2. “Dream Police”3. “If You Want My Love”4. “She’s Tight”5. “Ain’t That a Shame”6. “Boys & Girls & Rock N Roll”7. “Downed”8. Bass solo9. “I Know What I Want”10. “The Flame”11. “I Want You to Want Me”12. “Surrender”13. “Clock Strikes Ten”14. “Goodnight”
Def Leppard Albums Ranked
From their metal-edged debut to their pop breakthrough to the recent records, we rank every single LP.
Gallery Credit: Nick DeRiso
