DEF LEPPARD's PHIL COLLEN: Touring With MÖTLEY CRÜE Is 'Like Being At School With All Of Your Best Friends'

In a new interview with Radioacktiva Colombia, DEF LEPPARD guitarist Phil Collen was asked what it's like to be touring once again with his longtime friends in MÖTLEY CRÜE decades after they first shared the stage together. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "It's great. We've known 'em for years. I've known all of 'em since the '80s — early '80s — and we played with them first time in '83. It's great. It's like being at school with all of your best friends. It's really fun. We've got this [shared chartered] airplane [on the tour] that all of us are on there. And it's great. There's two bands that are still around. And I think it means more as you get older. There's this thing being young, ta-da-da, but there's something about really doing it still later on that makes you — I don't know — appreciate it more."

DEF LEPPARD's performance in Bogotá Saturday night (February 25) went ahead as scheduled, hours after it was revealed that singer Joe Elliott was hospitalized for respiratory issues.

After playing in Mexico City and Monterrey last week, DEF LEPPARD and MÖTLEY CRÜE arrived in Bogotá Friday night (February 24) for what is scheduled to be the third stop on their joint 2023 world tour. However, a short time later, El Tiempo reported that Elliott had checked in to Clínica de Marly, a hospital in Bogotá, because he was experiencing dyspnea, which is the medical term for difficulty breathing or shortness of breath.

On Saturday afternoon, DEF LEPPARD's social media shared a brief video of Elliott at the Parque Simón Bolívar venue in which he said he was suffering from "moderate-to-severe altitude sickness" but vowed to play the Bogotá show.

DEF LEPPARD and MÖTLEY CRÜE's co-headline "The World Tour" is hitting Latin America and Europe before it comes to the U.S. in August. Produced by Live Nation, the U.S. leg of the world tour kicks off on August 5 in Syracuse, New York.

Earlier this month, MÖTLEY CRÜE and DEF LEPPARD played two shows at the 7,000-capacity Hard Rock Live at Etess Arena in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The Atlantic City gigs marked MÖTLEY CRÜE's first U.S. live appearances since the announcement that founding guitarist Mick Mars would no longer tour with the legendary rock act. He is being replaced on the road by former ROB ZOMBIE and MARILYN MANSON guitarist John 5.

DEF LEPPARD is continuing to tour in support of its latest album, "Diamond Star Halos", which sold 34,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in its first week of release in May 2022 to land at position No. 10 on the Billboard 200 chart. It marked the band's eighth top 10 LP.

Of "Diamond Star Halos"' 34,000 units earned for the week, album sales comprised 32,000, SEA units comprised 2,000 (equaling 2.7 million on-demand official streams of the album’s songs) and TEA units comprised less than 500 units.

DEF LEPPARD's previous Top 10 albums included "Pyromania" (which peaked at No. 2 in 1983),"Hysteria" (No. 1 for six weeks in 1988),"Adrenalize" (No. 1 for five weeks in 1992),"Retro Active" (No. 9; 1983),"Rock Of Ages: The Definitive Collection" (No. 10; 2005),"Songs From The Sparkle Lounge" (No. 5; 2008) and "Def Leppard" (No. 10; 2015).

Last summer, DEF LEPPARD completed "The Stadium Tour" with MÖTLEY CRÜE and guests POISON and JOAN JETT & THE BLACKHEARTS. The 36-date trek was originally scheduled to take place in the summer of 2020 but ended up being pushed back to 2021, and then to 2022, due to the coronavirus crisis.