10 Perfect Albums That Defined The '80s

Once the glam rock scene started to dissipate, things didn't necessarily start to get serious. After all, this was the '80s, a decade that practically relied on being campy in their music half of the time. And once MTV really kicked in, the entire hard rock scene got a second wind with the help of a few lads out of Sheffield.

Though High N Dry marks the moment that Def Leppard hooked up with superproducer Mutt Lange for the first time, Pyromania is where they really began to dominate the landscape, with songs that could go toe to toe with the likes of Michael Jackson on the charts. Instead of the usual riffs that were reminiscent of Led Zeppelin, these were the kind of tracks that could actually manage to cross over to pop radio, with singles like Photograph having enough earworms to be playing through your head for hours on end.

This proved to only be the beginning for Leppard's domination of the rock scene, eventually going on to sell millions of copies of this record before topping it with Hysteria. As far as the definitive sound though, Pyromania marks the moment where hair metal started to come into its own. Van Halen may have got the ball rolling back in the day, but this is where the entire tide starts to shift.