“The studio bill came to £148.50. So with the £1.50 in change we all bought a celebratory bag of fish and chips”: Before superstardom and multi-million-selling albums, the young Def Leppard made their very first record on the cheap

Def Leppard.

In November 1978, five young men traveled 60 miles from their hometown of Sheffield to Hull for their first recording session in a pro studio. The result was The Def Leppard EP – a three-track vinyl seven-inch that set the young band on the path to global stardom. But they couldn’t have done it without the generosity of their singer’s father.

Back in ’78, the price for a two-day session at Fairview Studios in Hull was £150. That was a lot of money for a working class family in the UK in those days. But Joe Elliott, Def Leppard’s singer, managed to persuade his father, Joe Elliott Sr, to give them the cash.