歇斯底里 (1987)

Hysteria is the fourth studio album by English rock band Def Leppard, released on 3 August 1987, by Mercury Records. The album is the follow-up to the band's 1983 breakthrough, Pyromania. Hysteria's creation took over three years and was plagued by delays, including the aftermath of the car accident on 31 December 1984 that cost drummer Rick Allen his left arm. Subsequent to the album's release, Def Leppard published a book titled Animal Instinct: The Def Leppard Story, written by Rolling Stone magazine senior editor David Fricke, on the three-year recording process of Hysteria and the difficult times the band endured through the mid-1980s. Lasting 62 minutes and 32 seconds, it is the band's longest studio album to date.

Hysteria was the band's third and final album to be produced by Robert John "Mutt" Lange. Accordingly to Joe Elliott, many names for the album were floated around including a joke title "Trouble Up Mill." Other titles that were considered were 'Paranoia' and 'Animal Instincts'. The final title of the album Hysteria was conceived by Allen referring to his car crash, the amputation of his arm, and the ensuing worldwide media coverage surrounding it. It is the last album to feature guitarist Steve Clark before his death in 1991, although songs co-written by him would appear on the band's next album, Adrenalize (1992).

Although initial sales stalled outside the band's devoted fanbase, it soon became a worldwide commercial success, reaching number one on both the Billboard 200 and the UK Albums Chart. It is Def Leppard's best-selling album to date, selling over 20 million copies worldwide, including 12 million in the US alone, and spawned seven hit singles, making it one of the best-selling albums of all time.

Background and recording

Soon after completing the Pyromania tour in February 1984, the band commenced writing and pre-production for what became Hysteria in Dublin, using Fostex 4-track cassette recorders to capture ideas. Early sketches of "Animal", "Gods Of War" and "Armageddon It" were developed during this period. Lange joined them to help with writing and arrangements, but at late notice informed the group he could not commit to producing the album due to burnout from a gruelling schedule from the past few years. Thus, they had to find another producer who was available and they went with Jim Steinman.

Sessions with Steinman began at Wisseloord Studios, Holland on 11 August 1984, with Neil Dorfsman as engineer. However, it became clear that Steinman was not the right producer for them, that his standards were not as high as Lange's: Steinman's intention to make a raw-sounding record that captured the moment conflicted with the band's interest in creating a bigger, more pristine pop production. As singer Joe Elliott observed, "[Steinman] wouldn't adapt and we wouldn't compromise", and by October 1984 Steinman was ousted from the project. Dorfsman could not see the album through as he had commitments to work with Dire Straits on what became Brothers in Arms – he would later mention that they "barely [had] drums and bass on seven songs" after three months of work. In a 2026 interview Elliott confirms that they worked with Steinman for eight weeks and recorded seven songs that he still has a "box of tapes marked Hysteria: The Steinman Sessions" in his library. The songs worked on with Steinman were: "Don't Shoot Shotgun", "Run Riot", "Animal", "Women", "Gods of War", "Love and Affection" and a version of "Love Bites" that later was rewritten and released as the b-side "I Wanna Be Your Hero".

After parting ways with Steinman and scrapping the material from those sessions, the band tried to produce the album themselves with Lange's engineer Nigel Green. However, as Steve Clark recalled, "it was very slow work because we didn't have any sort of headmaster there, and we had to try everything five different ways."