10 Rock Bands That Continued Without Major Members

As the '80s were starting to become the decade we recognize today, the hard rock world was laying at Def Leppard's feet. Around the same time that the starlets off of Sunset were making a name for themselves, Sheffield's finest had just acquired AC/DC superproducer Mutt Lange and riding high off of the success of their first blockbuster album High n Dry. The real damage would be done on the next album though, but not before they had to let go of some dead weight.

During the recording for what would become Pyromania, Lange was notorious for cracking down on the performances, which guitarist Pete Willis wasn't truly equipped for. Having been drinking throughout the tour, Willis was getting less and less reliable to come up with the right solos to some of the songs, leading to one particular session where he could barely play after drinking an entire bottle of brandy.

While sending him back home to cool out for a few weeks, the band eventually tried out different guitarists while back at the studio before finding technician Phil Collen to round out the guitar sound. All of a sudden, there was a twin guitar assault that gave you the punkish energy of Steve Clarke with the preciseness of Collen's playing. Though Willis' rhythm tracks do appear on the album, this was just the beginning of Leppard's quest to dominate the rock scene.