DEF LEPPARD singer Joe Elliott spoke with Jonny Abrams from Sport.co.uk recently about a number of topics including the World Cup, his side project DOWN 'N OUTZ and the future of his day job.

About Def Leppard's plans Elliott remarked: "We’re having a year off the road. After 32 years’ unbroken service to this band and five years of non-stop touring, I was the first of us to say, 'I’m not doing it next year.' I can’t be wheeled out to sing those songs every night for no reason. Unless we’ve got a new album out, what’s the point? I don’t need the money that badly so if I don’t get any artistic satisfaction from it then there’s no point. So we’re taking a year off to recharge our batteries individually so that, when we come back together, there’s a new, refreshed energy for us to exploit, if you like. We’re all relaxed, doing what we want to do, and we don’t have to report in every day. If somebody wants to go and climb Mount Everest and I don’t find out about it until they get back down then good for them! I don’t need a daily update or a Twitter, thank you very much. But we are doing stuff to prepare for next year. Literally this week we’re going to be ploughing through live recordings because we’re going to release a live album, so we’ve basically got to listen to all of them, decide which nights we were on fire and use those versions. There’s talk of a box set and we’re writing some new stuff. We can be at home writing and emailing bits and bobs to each other – 'here, I’ve got this song, it needs lyrics' – so we don’t have to be in the same room to do that. So we’re doing bits and bobs under the radar that, by the end of this year, will become a nice, big lumpy mess that needs sorting out, if you like! But we are going to be back out next year, for sure."

Read the entire interview here.