Hysteria in Allentown

Def Leppard
Opening Act: Europe
Allentown Fairgrounds
Allentown, PA
Wednesday, July 27th, 1988
General Admission
$17

So a lot of what I do for concerts involves traveling to other cities. Sometimes it's a band that I follow around and need to see as many times as possible. Other times, it's a band that isn't playing my town and I need to see them. Who was that first band that made me want to travel to see them?

It was Def Leppard for my only third concert ever.

You have to start somewhere. Hysteria was one of the first compact discs I ever bought, the day I got my CD player. I think they've aged the best of the hair metal bands, with the nice harmonies and two lead melodic guitarists. I'll still sing along when they're on the radio. Def Leppard played Philly early on the first leg of the tour, almost a year earlier, but I wasn't familiar with them yet. They came back to the US for a summer shed tour and set a date for Allentown, but not Philly. Allentown was about an hour and a half away.

I had to see Def Leppard. I remember being at synagogue one Saturday, telling Debbie and Sue they were coming. Europe was Susan's favorite band, so she was in. My dad said Allentown wasn't too far away, and he could take us. When I told A about it, she was in too.

The day of the show, we dressed my poor dad in a tiedyed tshirt and jeans so he would fit in. The show was general admission, with standing on the "floor" of the fairgrounds and seats back in the grandstand. I don't know why we needed a chaperone at this show, dad let us stand in front while he got a seat. We met up after the show.

It looked there were two lines of people waiting to get in the venue. We stood in the shorter line. Ha! This line circled around the parking lot and became the longer line. There was a mass of people up by the stage, but we found a spot right behind the handicapped section - a raised portion on the floor. We could see great, because the section in front of us were sitting and we were above the rest of the crowd.

I really enjoyed the songs from both bands. They played all the songs we expected them to. I'm sorry I don't remember any of the details of the performance.

Shortly after the concert, we found out that Def Leppard was coming back to Philly, on the day before my birthday. I didn't go to that one, because I had just seen them in Allentown a few months earlier.