Taylor Swift Admitted She Was a ‘Freak’ About 1 Rock Band
Taylor Swift began her career as a country singer and now releases pop music, but one of her favorite music artists falls firmly in the rock genre. She spoke often about her love of the band and expressed her desire to perform with them. She once even had the opportunity to perform with the group.
Taylor Swift said she adored a rock band
As Swift’s career began to pick up steam, she realized she had the opportunity to collaborate with artists she’d long admired.
“I have crazy dream collaborations,” she told MTV, noting, “I look at people like Jay-Z and Eminem, and if there was any way that it would make sense to, you know, collaborate with them … I would never want to do a collaboration that did not make sense.”
She felt particularly excited by the idea of performing live with Def Leppard. They were one of her favorite bands.
“As for a live collaboration, I would love to do a show with Def Leppard,” she said. “I’m a Def Leppard freak. To me, music has never really been defined by genre. Now, with digital and everything else going on, lines between genres are getting more blurred.”
Taylor Swift once performed with the band
Not long after Swift said she wanted to work with Def Leppard, she did. She teamed up with the band on the television show CMT Crossroads.
“Every time I’ve seen Crossroads on CMT I’ve always thought, ‘If I ever get to do one of those, it HAS to be with Def Leppard!,’ so this is really a dream come true for me,” she said, per Smooth Radio. “I have been screaming the words to Def Leppard songs for years… so it’s amazing that I’m going to get to share a stage with them this year!”
Joe Elliott, the lead singer of the band, said they jumped on the opportunity at once.
“How cool is this?” he said. “Country’s hottest young star wanting to work with us!”
They performed Def Leppard’s “Photograph,” “Pour Some Sugar on Me,” “When Love and Hate Collide,” and Swift’s “Love Story,” “Teardrops on My Guitar,” and “Our Song.”
Joe Elliott once spoke about what it was like to work with her
According to Elliott, Def Leppard agreed to appear on CMT Crossroads because Swift had explicitly stated she wanted to perform with the band.
“The whole thing came together because somebody walked into our dressing room with a laptop… He goes, ‘It’s Taylor Swift, she’s doing this interview, and she said there was only band that she would ever do a Crossroads with, and it was Def Leppard,’” he told Rolling Stone in 2018. “We went, ‘Wow, OK, get in touch with her, see what she thinks.’ Lo and behold, couple of months go by and, all of a sudden, we’re doing this show.”
He said their collaboration went off without a hitch.
“Getting hooked in with Taylor was great,” he said. “She was 17 years old. We were more than willing to do this. We got a new record just out. It was a bit of fun. It was a four-day project. It was two days of rehearsals. It was two shows and everybody did their homework. We turned up knowing all the chords, knowing all the lyrics. There weren’t really any difficulties.”
