DEF LEPPARD To Perform On Season Finale Of Quebec's 'La Voix'

According to Le Journal De Montréal, DEF LEPPARD will perform on the season finale of "La Voix", Quebec, Canada's version of the popular sing-off competition show "The Voice". Also set to appear on the April 12 episode are Jean Leloup, Kelly Clarkson, Cœur de Pirate, Louis-Jean Cormier, Melissa Etheridge, Patrice Michaud, Ariane Moffatt and Alex Nevsky.

DEF LEPPARD has completed recording its new album for a late 2015 release.

During a recent interview with Billy Kidd of the 100.3 Jack FM radio station, DEF LEPPARD singer Joe Elliott stated about the band's first new studio album since 2008's "Songs From The Sparkle Lounge": "I keep wanting to say [it's] probably one of the most honest records we've ever made, but that makes everything sound like everything else we've done has been dishonest or something, [which] it's not. But it's one of the most refreshingly, kind of, easy albums that we've made. There was no big fights or [that] it took forever to do. It was done over a period of about… by the time it's finished, over about 14 months. But that's only because we did a month's work last February [2014]. We did about another two weeks in May. We just did another month this February just gone — last month. And little bits in between where I'd be on the mic while the rest of the guys were back home, you know. So we've not spent a massive amount of time on it. It came very naturally."

He continued: "We got together last year to write what we thought was just gonna be an EP. And we'd been listening probably a little too hard to the naysayers, saying that the album [format] was dead. We were kind of thinking, 'Well, maybe it is, you know. Let's just do an EP.' But when we all played each other everything that we had, we had 12 songs that we couldn't really whittle down to three of four; we liked them all. So we looked at each other and said, 'Well, maybe the album's not dead then, you know, because I think we've just written one.'"

Elliott added: "When we got back together last May to work more on those 12 songs, we wrote three more. So, you know, we had this pool of 15 songs knocking around, of which, you know, 12, 13 or 14 will make the album, no doubt. But it's a… it's got a bit of everything. It's got some stuff that will be instantly recognizable as DEF LEPPARD, and it's got some stuff that's just us stretching our wings a little further than normal, and making a record that people of our mature age should be making. But it rocks. It's a real good record."

DEF LEPPARD will return to the road April 15 for a Canadian tour, followed by Europe in May and June. A U.S. tour with STYX and TESLA will kick off June 23 in Tampa, Florida.

DEF LEPPARD released a deluxe, expanded edition of 1996's "Slang" album in February 2014.