There's no business like Joe business

Joe Elliott is best-known as the frontman of Def Leppard, but his Dublin home also houses a studio, Joe’s Garage, which has hosted a number of prominent Irish indie acts, including Revelino, Boss Volenti, Ricky Warwick and Julie Feeney. The studio was built some 20 years ago, and though at first it was used exclusively by Def Leppard, Joe eventually decided to allow other artists to work in the facility.

“It’s actually in my house,” he explains, “and at first it didn’t have its own door, but now it does. Occasionally I do let other people in, but only if I know them, or the producer they’re working with, so that it doesn’t get trashed. There’s been the odd bit of work done there, although not too much actual recording – it’s usually mixing.
“A friend of mine, who does occasional engineering here, has just mixed a song that was number one for six weeks in Kazakhstan, because the singer won Pop Idol in that country. He did a Euro remix of this song, which I haven’t heard, but I’m like, ‘Hey, glad to be of service!’”
However, Elliot has certainly heard some of the material recorded in Joe’s Garage by Irish acts.
“I listened to Julie Feeney’s album, 13 Songs,” he recalls. “It’s a bit off-centre! But I actually quite like it; she reminded me a lot of Annette Peacock, who was an off-the-wall, ‘70s jazz-pop artist from New York. It’s a bit wacky, and I’m for all that. But so much stuff has come through here, that a lot of the people who’ve been and gone have already split-up!”
Being a huge Rolling Stones fan, I can’t help but enquire about Joe’s contribution to one of Ronnie Wood’s solo albums.
“Ronnie came over to look at my studio when he was having his built,” explains Joe. “He wanted to see what kind of quality I had. It was about 1991, and a friend of mine brought him over. He just popped in, said hello, and gave me a gift, which was a painting he’d done of Bob Dylan. I’ve still got that hung in my studio. Then he got his studio built, and we started hanging out. He asked me to sing on some stuff, so I went to Ronnie’s place in Kildare for a couple of nights.
“Charlie Watts was also over. So we had dinner, and then we went into the studio and worked on a few tracks. One of the songs was called ‘Show Me’, and Ronnie asked me to sing backing vocals on it. There wasn’t a backing track, so I ended up playing bass, with Ronnie on guitar and Charlie on drums. I was thinking, ‘No one’s going to believe me when I tell them this!’”
Def Leppard have also used the Garage as a rehearsal space, and indeed the group are shortly to head out on a new tour. The itinerary includes a stop-off at the Dublin O2 this month, with the bill also featuring Whitesnake, Journey and Tesla.
“It’s pretty much sold-out already, so it’s going to be great,” enthuses Joe. “When we were confirmed to do Download in Donnington, I said to Denis (Desmond), ‘Can we not bring this to Dublin?’ It wasn’t possible to do anything outdoors, so I said, ‘Let’s just bring some of it into the O2.’ We’re doing Dublin on the 12th, headlining the Sunday night at Donnington on the 14th, and then we go over to the States, where we’ve been nominated for four country awards for the CMT Crossroads thing we did with Taylor Swift! After that, we’re doing a 55-date American tour, so it’s pretty busy.”

Def Leppard play the O2, Dublin on June 12 with Whitesnake, Journey and Tesla.